The Muscovites
by Dia1
Summary: NEW CHAPTERS! A Russian cult, The Muscovites, kills Martha Landon to warn Chekov away (he wants to rescue his cousin) Sulu and Uhura help their friend infiltrate. Follows Heart's Code, Acid but can be read alone. R&R PLS!
1. Murder

THE MUSCOVITES  
  
Uhura put her stylus down, dropped her hands to her lower back and arched against the ache she felt there. Shore leave couldn't come quickly enough.  
  
'Well, it's my own fault for saying I'd switch with Lee.' Ensign Reiko Lee, the new communications trainee had wanted to go down to Iqualuit with Yeoman Landon and Ensign Chekov.  
  
All three had some strange obsession with skating. Chekov had taught Landon, a girl who grew up on the beaches of Hawaii, to skate a few months back and since then they had spent a lot of time in the ships small rink.  
  
Uhura shivered even at the thought of that. To her it was like being cooped up in a meat locker. Pavel laughed at her thin blood, "It's refreshing!" he teased, watching her shiver while watching one of Landon's lessons.  
  
"It's bloody freezing!" she had retorted, "Only penguins and polar bears should romp around in these temperatures!"   
  
"You just have to know how to keep warm." he laughed, pulling Landon close to him. Uhura rolled her eyes at him, while Landon swatted him and he pretended to lose his footing and made a great big display of falling on his butt.  
  
And, then he laid on the ice and didn't get up and Landon and Uhura shook their heads at his theatrics, until they saw the colour drain from his face and heard an anguished, "Shit!" come from his clenched mouth.  
  
He'd ruptured a disc in his back. McCoy was furious with him. But then, Pavel figured, McCoy was always mad at him.  
  
Like this morning. McCoy had spotted him on his way to the transporter room. "If you're playing hockey today, you'd bloody well better not come back here with anything ruptured because I'm telling you, you've used up your whole entire sickbay allowance!"  
  
"Yes, Dr. McCoy." Chekov had grinned at him, and made a little show of hiding his hockey stick behind him.  
  
That's where Lee, Landon and Chekov were headed on Iqualuit. Pavel Chekov had a hockey obsession, Landon had a renewed obsession with Pavel Chekov and Lee just had an obsession with hockey players.  
  
And, Reiko Lee admitted to herself that watching Landon and Chekov fight all the time gave her hope that someday there'd be a void in Pavel Chekov's life that she would like to fill. In her darker moments, she thought of ways to speed that day to her.  
  
For now, she contented herself on watching him play hockey. He was a good hockey player. He was smaller than most, but he was very fast and smart and was a 'heads up' player, as they said. He watched the fast game very carefully and took advantage of openings, he could see plays begin to develop and anticipate where the opposing team were going to put the puck and be there to take it for his own team.  
  
He played centre. He won many more face-off drops than he lost. He practiced face-off drops on the Enterprise, in the grav ball court, he just got the generator to drop hockey pucks in 1G for him instead of the grav ball in 0G.   
  
He was an excellent penalty killer who could waste penalty time by controlling, or as he called it, 'ragging', the puck to tick the time away on the clock. He loved penalty killing almost more than he loved scoring goals.   
  
When his team had a penalty, and was playing a man short, it was a great game to him to be able to win the draw off the face-off, send the puck to his wingman, scoot up the ice and receive the pass from his wingman and then just drag the puck around avoiding the opposing team players with stealth and quick changes in speed and direction. It was cat and mouse. And, he was a smart, quick little mouse teasing a big, stupid and slow cat.  
  
He was almost always the smallest player on the ice and although the games on Iqualuit were friendly, they were competitive. He'd played there twice before this leave.  
  
Iqualuit was similar to it's namesake, the northernmost Canadian province. Uhura shivered involuntarily. 'Well, I'll drink lots of hot chocolate!'   
  
Uhura smiled. They had great hot chocolate on the little planet. Fourth from their sun, they were. A small place, only half the size of Earth. Iqualuit's only 'town', also called, simply Iqualuit, generated 1 Earth G gravity for the comfort and safety of it's visitors.  
  
It was sunny, with slightly green tinged skies and the area where Iqualuit was built had hills covered with scrubby, tough little brush and evergreens very similar to Earth's. About four thousand people called Iqualuit home, but there were usually about six to seven thousand in town at any one time.  
  
The Hudson's Bay Company, the oldest department store on Earth had established Iqualuit as a trading post in the grand tradition of the fur traders who had opened the Northern Territories and Upper Canada in the early part of the 17th century.  
  
It had amenities. A hockey arena, of course. A couple of small hotels and inns, cafes, restaurants. A frozen lake for skating. And, a liberal supply of bars and other drinking establishments. And, a few less well advertised, but well used, businesses in the narrow alleys at the edge of town. The town's constabulary, a Royal Canadian Mounted Police detachment, turned a blind eye as long as there wasn't violence and the vendors kept their medical checks up to date.  
  
Iqualuit was establishing a solid reputation with traders of all sorts including Orions, Ferengi, Telerites and Andorians. They supplied these ships with all manner of Earth comforts and exotics including warm Hudson Bay blankets, one of which Martha Landon had bought Pavel Chekov for his twenty-fourth birthday. Pavel always had many blankets on his bed. He liked the weight of them. He kept his quarters cool and enjoyed burrowing into his warm cocoon every night.  
  
Uhura thought that was so odd! Of course, she kept her quarters very warm and the thin silk coverlet she used was completely inadequate according to her Russian coworker.  
  
"Well, I guess we could never share a bed." Uhura had purred at him, teasing. And she was delighted when he actually blushed and lost the power of speech.   
  
The blankets were popular in the town itself. Iqualuit was cold. It was inhabited by hearty souls who not only tolerated the cold but relished it. Finns, Norwegians, Swedes, Russians, French Canadians, English Canadians, Poles and Ukrainians worked the base, but, more importantly, they worked on their hockey game.   
  
They had an open league and anyone who wanted to participate was welcome. Pavel Chekov more than wanted to participate again. He was drooling at the mouth.  
  
He gleefully pulled his Moscow Dynamo jersey out of his closet, hauled his skates down to engineering for a laser sharpening, and taped the curved blade of his Koho stick with black hockey tape, not white, that would be blasphemous!  
  
He had felt such a rush when he heard they were headed for Iqualuit again. He needed a break. He needed to have some fun.   
  
The news from home had not been good. Not good at all. His 22 year-old cousin Natalia Federovna was still with the Muscovites. She refused to come home. She refused to speak to her family. She was happy, she said, perfectly happy and she simply wanted to be left alone.  
  
Pavel frowned unhappily thinking about his cousin. The one he thought of, affectionately, as 'The Pest'. Two years younger than he, when they were kids that was a gulf that was as wide as the Arat Sea. She followed him around and he pretended to be annoyed by that. But, he knew she knew better. He loved her to pieces!  
  
His heart ached for the twinkle in that girls eye now. 'The Pixie' was how he thought of her later. She got the giggles over everything. She cried over anything. She loved to make little things for him, tiny little paper butterflies, exquisite in their detail, decorated the mirror in his bathroom.  
  
Landon had been surprised when she'd seen those, thinking they were an awfully feminine touch. She had felt a flare of jealousy, wondering what female had given him such things, and then she'd felt a fool when he told her about Natalia after she questioned him.  
  
Natalia Federovna had dark short hair, she was very petite, tiny. She had big eyes, a tiny mouth, a little nose, high cheek bones. She was, as Sulu said, "Cute as a button!"  
  
But, the last time Pavel had spoken to her, six months ago, she was no longer, 'as cute as a button'. Her face was gray. She wasn't petite anymore. She was downright thin. She was dull eyed, vacant, vague. Smiling that damned silly smile all day, shaking her head slowly when asked to talk about her life with the Muscovites.  
  
Pavel knew exactly what they were. A cult. There was no question in his mind.   
  
There was certainly a question in Martha Landon's mind. And, he couldn't believe they were having this argument again, here, on Iqualuit, in their hotel room. Not when he had other things to talk to her about.  
  
"Pav, you have to let people believe what they want. You know, you can be pretty judgmental sometimes." Martha said, carefully putting a very delicate and lacy and especially, tiny, piece of lingerie into the dresser drawer. Her fingers lingered over it's satiny surface and she kept her head ducked coyly down but lifted her eyes to meet his and he felt the jolt go through him that always went through him when she gave him that look.  
  
But, he shut himself down and ignored her, "Judgmental! I am not judgmental!"  
  
She removed her hands from the garment and shoved the dresser drawer closed harder than was necessary. She crossed her arms and sat in the chair by the window with a sigh.  
  
"Martha, they, Natalia tells me that when she first goes there it is for two days to learn about them. It is fifteen hours a day in an auditorium."  
  
She crossed one leg over the other and the top one swung up and down, betraying her irritation. "Well, it's just like a rally, or a revival or something...."  
  
He debated for a second about continuing but at least when they were talking about this, they weren't talking about what they should be talking about. 'Chicken shit!' he berated himself and then said to her, "Martha, they're using sleep deprivation. Remember your Academy training about coercive techniques. They control everything she does, what she eats, when she sleeps, when she wakes,.."  
  
"Maybe, that's what she needs. Maybe that's what she's been looking for." She started to chew her lip and Pavel knew she had reached a higher level of pique.  
  
He was feeling decidedly 'piqued' himself. He'd played a hard game of hockey, but the arena's water supply was interrupted and he couldn't shower there and he hadn't showered yet and he was sweaty and he was still wearing his Moscow Dynamo jersey and it was damp with his sweat and he was angry at himself because he still wasn't ready to say what he needed to say to Martha. And, instead he continued arguing with her about Natalia.  
  
"She's always been searching for something, her whole life, but they...they force confession....you must tell them everything and then, I read about people, people who have left. You see, they know everything about you, if you cheated on your wife..."  
  
"You'd think of that..." she snapped.  
  
That surprised him, "What is that meaning?"  
  
"Nothing." she chewed her lip harder and swung her foot and looked out the window at the darkening sky.  
  
"Nothing? Is not nothing. What is that?" he demanded, getting angrier by the second at her unspoken accusation.  
  
She turned to look back at him and said, childishly, "If you don't know I'm not telling you."  
  
"Oh, for...." he muttered a few choice words under his breath. It was Lee she was talking about. He knew Reiko was attracted to him. He was attracted to her. She was funny and bubbly, but not silly.  
  
He was about to reply to her but thought better of it and then she said, "It's nothing, look don't change the subject. I don't think you have any right to go and try to get her out of there, it's her life."  
  
His anger flared that she dare to tell him what he should and shouldn't do. "I'm bloody well going to go get her and I'm going to bring her home. I've already arranged leave, in three days I'll have her and then I'm taking her home!"  
  
"It's her life, Pavel!" She jumped up and started to pace around the room. He felt like jumping out the window but instead paced himself, his arms crossed tightly in front of him.  
  
"It's not her life! You don't understand! You don't understand!"  
  
"I'm not stupid, Pavel!"  
  
He stopped pacing and threw his arms up, "I never said such a thing!"  
  
"You imply it, all the time."  
  
"Oh, for Chrissakes!" He turned away from her, turned back. "I do not! I think you are very smart."  
  
"Oh, my god! You sound like you're talking about your dog. I think she is very smart."  
  
"You are.....Martha...how the hell did we get to this again? Why do you....." He took her shoulders but she shrugged him off.  
  
He let out a breath, "Shit. I don't know how we always come back to this, I don't know why you think people think you are not intelligent. Is not true."  
  
She made that tsking sound that always annoyed him and before he could think, "Maybe it's because you're so fucking stuck on your looks you think there's not enough room for brains too!"  
  
Her mouth dropped open. He sighed, 'oh, boy.' to himself. But then, his anger flared again at how she could make him feel guilty when he didn't do anything, "I didn't say anything, imply anything, make a joke about, or...nothing! I said nothing about you being stupid."  
  
"You said I didn't understand!" Now, tears were choking her voice as well.  
  
"I didn't say you COULDN'T understand! I said you DIDN'T!" he said desperately because he couldn't stand to see her cry.  
  
"It's the same thing!"  
  
"Is not!   
"It is!  
  
"I...it's not the same thing, how is it the same thing!"  
  
"Maybe it's the language problem."  
  
"Language problem? I don't have problem with language!"  
  
She shrugged at him, and he exploded, 'Fuck! I can't believe you sometimes!'  
  
"Don't yell at me!"  
  
"I'm not! Okay, I am! Shit!!" He turned away from her. He struggled to get his breathing under control. Why was he doing this? Why were they doing this? The sex. That's what it was. The bloody sex was....well, spectacular. They had a chemistry, no question about that. But, Jesus Christ! They couldn't communicate, he should have broken it off for good.  
  
They were on. They were off. They were on. They were off.  
  
"What are you doing, honey?" Uhura had asked him once, finding him in the rec room in the middle of the night after another 'Martha fight'.  
  
He shrugged miserably at her. "I don't know."  
  
"Have you thought about counseling?"  
  
He burst out laughing, but cut it off when he saw the stern look on her face. "Uhura, I've been in therapy most of my life. I think I qualify for a degree in psychology."  
  
"Why don't you put some of it to use?"  
  
"Because knowing something intellectually is not the same as living it." He looked at her and she gave him a look that told him she knew that he knew how lame and simplistic that answer was. "I know. I don't know....what it is with us. We are just drawn to each other but....oh, man, we don't have much in common. She's so....goddamned....she's....she picks fights, she's defensive about....everything. Oh, you know, I don't want to sit here and criticize her."  
  
"Do you love her?"  
  
He didn't answer and finally dropped his gaze from hers and looked instead at the little piece of paper he was twisting in his hands.   
  
She watched him and then asked, "Does she love you?"  
  
And, he knew that answer right away, "Yes." whispered. Sad. Guilty.  
  
"Pavel." Uhura leaned forward and put her hand on his arm, "Pavel, you can't stay with someone just because they love you. Not if you don't love them."  
  
"I know but I...." he stopped and looked at the table top.  
  
"Go on."  
  
"I don't want to go on." He said, a bit defiantly.  
  
"Okay."  
  
They listened to the silence for awhile and finally, and Uhura knew it would be him first, but didn't expect him to say, "I like the sex."  
  
She didn't answer him. He looked at her. "Maybe I'm just a greedy little shit."  
  
She shook her head.  
  
He swallowed. "I...can't stand hurting anyone...." He didn't have to say why, she knew his hundred reasons, some of which included remembering his own childhood abuse and pain and a paralyzing fear that he might turn out like his father.  
  
Sulu and she had observed him, a walking paradox, apologetic and cocky, sarcastic and sensitive, cynical and a melting fool. Uhura thought sometimes he was the most complex person she had ever known. More complex than Kirk, who was singular in his drive, his ambition. Sure he had a soft side but nothing overrode that passion for being the Captain.  
  
Sulu decided that the reason Pavel was such a mess of tangled emotions was because there wasn't any one thing that dominated his character. He was all of those conflicting emotions in equal measure....forever at war.  
  
They both decided that was why Spock seemed drawn to him. On the surface, the excitable, animated Russian seemed to have nothing in common with the cool Vulcan. But, Spock was only cool on the surface. He had equal measures of human emotion and Vulcan logic battling it out inside him.  
  
Uhura knew that Pavel appreciated the calming influence the Vulcan had on him. He seemed able to focus on his work with Spock, he found it restful, even meditative working through some math problem with the Vulcan.  
  
"You can't marry her, Pavel."  
  
Chekov looked up at that. He smiled faintly. "Sure I can." he said very quietly.  
  
Uhura swatted at him, "Don't you dare!" She kidded him, but the smile faded from her face when he didn't return her joviality. "Pavel, you wouldn't."  
  
He bit his lip and looked very guilty for a moment, but he couldn't do it to her and so he broke into a big lopsided grin, she swatted him a lot harder this time, "You rotten little shit!"  
  
"I'm sorry." He covered his face in his hands for a moment. "Do you know it's been a year and a half? That's a long time to be with someone you're not in love with, isn't it." His eyes sparkled and Uhura's heart went out to him, he really couldn't bear to hurt anyone. She moved to the seat next to him and put an arm around him.  
  
"You're a really great guy, you know that? You each need to move on to find the people you're supposed to be with. What if you meet her tomorrow? You won't know it if you're with Martha. And, you have to let her be free to meet the man she is supposed to be with."  
  
That conversation came back and hit him again and he looked at Martha now, in their room in the Iqualuit Inn and he couldn't bring himself to do it. He couldn't tell her yet. Shit! Why couldn't he do it!  
  
He picked up his jacket. "I'm going for a walk."  
  
She didn't say anything to him. She just stared back at him with that look he could never decipher. That face would be burned into his mind for the rest of his life.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Uhura had called Kirk to the bridge as soon as the call came in. Now, she and the Captain and the Beta shift were all listening to the constable on the viewscreen.  
  
"Captain Kirk, I am Commander Sandra Racansky, I head up the RCMP detachment here on Iqualuit." The blonde woman's face softened with empathy, "I'm so sorry, Captain to have to tell you some very bad news."  
  
"What is it, Commander?"  
  
"There is no easy way to say this, so I will just say it. One of your crew has been murdered here."  
  
"Oh, my God! Who?"  
  
Uhura's entire body tensed, Sulu was down there, Scotty was down there, Chekov was down there, Lee and Landon and...  
  
"Martha Landon."  
  
"Oh, God!"  
  
"No!" Uhura's breath caught, she let it out, feeling her whole body rush with adrenaline enough to shake her to her core. Martha! No! It couldn't be!  
  
"Are you certain? I'm sorry, of course, Commander, of course you're certain, it's just....what...what happened?"  
  
"Oh, Captain, please don't apologize. I know it's a terrible shock. She was...stabbed. Stabbed many times. In her room at the Iqualuit Inn. I can tell you she didn't go down without a fight. She fought....very hard....I'm sorry, I know that is difficult to hear. don't know if you want to know that."  
  
"Everything, we want to know everything. Pavel Chekov was...."  
  
"He's here, at the detachment. He found her."  
  
Uhura's stomach dropped, "Oh, no."  
  
The Commander continued, "He's badly shaken. Our doctor is with him."  
  
"He wasn't with her?"  
  
Racansky shook her head, "Apparently, he came back before the assailants left, he was hit from behind, he has a slight concussion. Captain..."  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"There is something going on here. Something he's not telling me."  
  
"He's cooperating, isn't he?"  
  
"Of course. He's in shock. He's been given a sedative by our physician, very mild, but he's very....perhaps you can talk to him. I'm afraid I can't release him to you just yet. Don't worry, I'm sure it will only be a few hours. I haven't the facilities here for you to come down but if you could speak to him now through the comm system."  
  
"What makes you think he's holding something back?"  
  
"Just a hunch. I'm pretty good at those sir."  
  
"I'd like our ships surgeon to see him."  
  
"Certainly, Captain, I'll arrange that as soon as I can. Please let me run through the scenario before you speak to him."  
  
"Of course."  
  
She took out a note book and then never referred to it again during her description of the days horrible events. "Martha Landon and Pavel Chekov booked room 12 at Iqualuit Inn and checked in three hours ago. Pavel tells me they had a fight shortly after that and he decided to go for a walk himself. He was gone for over an hour. He came back, he opened the door, took a few steps inside and was hit from behind. He blacked out for, he thinks no more than a couple of minutes. He woke up, found her, called us for help, we arrived one minute and twenty seconds after his call. She had expired. He was holding her..." she swallowed, "It took us awhile to get him to let her go, he didn't seem to hear us at all which, of course, isn't uncommon. He was whispering to her, over and over, "I'm sorry Marth, I'm sorry Marth, I'm sorry Marth."  
  
"You don't think he did it!"  
  
"No, I know he didn't do it. The evidence doesn't point that way. Forensics preliminary reports that there were at least two, maybe three assailants. And, I have a hunch about him, too. He didn't do this. I'm certain of it. He was saying sorry because he had a fight with her and walked out. And, he wasn't there." She paused, "Poor kid."  
  
"I'm not sure I understand what..."  
  
"I'm getting to it, Captain. You see, there was a message left by the killers."  
  
"What?"  
  
"A Russian one."  
  
"What!"  
  
"They left a...a Russian icon on her, over her face. We didn't know that. Until Pavel told us. When he found her, she was in the bathroom. Her face had a double sided, hinged Icon draped over it."  
  
"What the hell does that mean?"   
"It means, I think your Ensign knows who did this. But, I don't think he's being uncooperative. I think he's just had such a terrible shock he hasn't come to terms with it yet. And, if he knows who did this, and if it had anything to do with him...it might be too much for him. He doesn't know us. But, he may talk to you. You're his Captain."  
  
Kirk felt sick to his stomach even as he nodded his assent to the Commanders plan.  
  
Racansky said something to somebody off screen and the viewscreen switched to a scene in another room.   
  
A small figure huddled in a blanket, his head hanging down. 'Oh, God,' Kirk thought, his heart aching.  
  
A man in a doctor's lab coat leaned close to Chekov, putting his arm around the smaller man's shoulders he spoke quietly to him. Chekov nodded, barely. The doctor looked at the viewscreen then, but still kept a protective arm around Pavel Chekov, who never looked up, never moved.  
  
"Captain." The man's voice was so gentle, Uhura was glad someone like that was with Pavel...oh, God! What must he be going through! She could hardly bear to look at the scene on the screen and at the same time, couldn't tear her eyes away as the doctor said quietly, "I'm Doctor Patterson. Pavel has a concussion but it's not too serious. He'll be fine. He's been sedated, very mild, but he's had a very, very bad shock and that takes a toll. I'm sure I don't need to ask you to be gentle with him. I want to get him to bed as soon as possible. And," the doctor paused, and said even more quietly, "We need to clean him up. He's been resistant to that. Perhaps you can help us with that, too."  
  
Kirk swallowed and found, to his surprise, he had a voice, "Of course."  
  
"All right." The doctor smiled and then said something to Pavel again, who nodded very slightly.  
  
And then, his head came up very slowly, and Kirk felt his chest clench.  
  
"Oh, sweetie." Uhura whispered to the face of devastation on the screen.  
  
His eyes were clouded, focused on some image inside of him that played itself over and over and over again in horrible hyper-realism so strong that reality only wavered around him like illusive shadow.   
  
And, there was blood on his face, blotches of it dried all down the right side of his face, matting his bangs to his forehead. It was on his neck and covered the front of his Moscow Dynamo jersey, but he was oblivious to it all, still focused somewhere else. His eyes didn't seek out the image on the viewscreen at all.  
  
"Ensign Chekov." Kirk said firmly.  
  
Pavel's eyes blinked once and then found his Captain but then, just looked away again, his eyes falling shut slowly.  
  
"Pavel...." Kirk said again and then, not waiting for a response, "Doctor, is he all right?"  
  
"Yes, Captain, he's fine. I have him monitored, please continue."  
  
"Pavel, can you answer me?"  
  
This time, Pavel closed his eyes again and nodded. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to concentrate but he felt like he was floating out of his own body. He took a breath, slowly and opened his eyes, "Yes....sir." he said very quietly.  
  
"We're sending Dr. McCoy down to you until you're released. No offense Dr. Patterson." Patterson waved Kirk's apology off and Kirk continued, "Pavel, can you tell me what happened?"  
  
Chekov closed his eyes, and shook his head slowly.  
  
"Pavel, you need to let the doctor clean you up, all right?"   
  
Chekov only shook his head again. "That's an order, Ensign."  
  
Chekov looked up at him then, his eyes were so unfocused Kirk couldn't tell if he was really looking at him. The Captain felt considerable distress at seeing the Ensign in this condition, at this horrible time and he felt a rush of anger.  
  
"Doctor! I think we can dispense with this! I want him put to bed for Godsakes, leave him be for now and just put him to bed the way he is! He can't even....Pavel, Ensign, go with the doctor and go to bed. We'll be there right away."  
  
Chekov didn't respond at all this time, Patterson frowned at the monitor Kirk could just see, "I'm sorry, Captain, I think you're right. He's slipping."  
  
"Slipping! What do you mean?"  
  
"Nothing dangerous, I assure you! The shock is overwhelming him but we'll control it. We need to get him to bed. Okay, Pavel, come on." He said very gently, "Sarah, give me a hand here!"   
  
A pretty blonde nurse appeared at Chekov's other side, Pavel glanced at her and let out the most blood curdling scream Kirk had ever heard. Uhura jumped out her chair as she watched in horror as Pavel screamed and screamed and then collapsed into the doctor's arms.  
  
~~~~~~~  
  
  
  
"He's gone." Racansky told Kirk bluntly, her face, amplified as it was by the viewscreen, clearly illustrated her consternation.  
  
"Gone! How the hell did that happen!" Kirk, never known for his diplomatic prowess, surprised even his Alpha command crew.   
  
Sulu kept his eyes set rigidly to the forward screen but he was a bit taken aback by the Captain's outburst.  
  
"Captain. I apologize. We did not consider him a flight risk. He asked the nurse to get him some tea. When she came back, he was gone. We have people looking for him. There's really nowhere to go. He can't have gotten fa...." The Commander held up her hand to Kirk, signaling a momentary time-out of their conversation and leaned over to listen as a subordinate whispered something in her ear. Her jaw clenched slightly.  
  
"I'm afraid I'll have to amend that, Captain Kirk," she said, straightening up. "He's taken a ship, the owner reported it missing ten minutes ago, witnesses said they saw it leave about an hour ago, they thought the owner had it."  
  
"Spock!" Kirk didn't need to finish his command as the Vulcan turned to his sensors and swept the area as Racansky apologized, "I'm sorry, Captain."  
  
"I thought you guys always get your man." Kirk replied.  
  
"We always get them, we don't always keep them."  
  
"Why didn't you call us as soon as he went missing?" Kirk demanded.  
  
"We thought we'd have found him by now. Any ideas where he's going?"  
  
Kirk shook his head and looked hopefully to Uhura who could only shrug as the Captain turned back to the helm/nav station. "Mr. Sulu?"  
  
Sulu swung around in his chair, "Sorry, Captain. I've no idea. Wish I did."  
  
"I'll upload a description of the ship to Enterprise, Captain. I'm afraid it's a long range scout with a maximum speed of Warp 4, if he's been gone an hour...."  
  
"He could be anywhere." Kirk finished for her, although he was furious with them for letting Chekov out of their sight, he couldn't help restraining himself in the face of the genuine contriteness displayed by the detachment Commander. It didn't hurt that she was what anyone would consider very attractive. Kirk mentally kicked himself, he was too easily manipulated by feminine beauty, if this had been a guy he'd have taken a strip off him.   
  
"Have you any other news on Yeoman Landon?" Kirk asked to get his mind back on track. He was tired. He needed this shore leave. He had needed it, that is. Now, he wished they'd never diverted to this miserable place.  
  
"Captain, that was the other reason I was calling. We've got a very small morgue here and no medical examiner. Never had a need until now. We'd like to release the body to Enterprise for the post mortem. And, we are formally asking you for assistance in our investigation of this homicide."  
  
"You're the police." he said, more harshly than he intended.  
  
"We're a trading post detachment, three people plus one physician, one nurse, no M.E. I was going to ask earlier, however, we got a little busy with a fight down at Jack's. It's been one of those days, I'm afraid."  
  
Kirk sighed, and tried to be more cooperative. "Of course, we'll offer any assistance you request. I'll have my security chief, Lt. Strevens contact you."  
  
"Thank you, Captain Kirk. Again, my apologies. We aren't boy scouts and I guess we weren't prepared. Perhaps, it's a good time to put in to the Company for an increased presence here."  
  
"Hopefully, you won't need it."  
  
"Hopefully."  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"Captain!" Uhura exclaimed, pressing her earpiece and listening. "It's Pavel!"   
  
The bridge had been very subdued since they'd found out less than an hour ago that he'd disappeared.  
  
"Let's hear it, Lt." Kirk said, getting up out of his seat to stand beside the command chair.  
  
"Enterprise...." It was Chekov's voice, sounding thin even though it was carried on a clear, strong signal.   
  
Sulu felt himself go a little cold at the sound of his friends voice. He had beamed up with the rest of the shore leave contingent on hearing the news about Landon. He still couldn't quite get his head around it.  
  
When he'd heard, he'd wanted to stay down there, he'd wanted to go be with Chekov, to be there for him, but he wasn't allowed. He was ordered back to the ship and since then he'd worried. The sound of the Russian's voice did little to assuage that concern, now.  
  
"Ensign Chekov! It's Captain Kirk."  
  
"Enterprise...." again, the voice wavering.   
  
Kirk turned to Uhura, "Can he hear us?"  
  
Uhura checked her board, and nodded at the Captain, as another "Enterprise..." came over the bridge comm system. The knot of concern twisted in her gut at the plaintive sound in that voice. 'He's in trouble.' she thought, more trouble than the obvious. Something else was going on here, as Commander Racansky had said. But, what?  
  
"Chekov, it's Captain Kirk, can you hear me?"  
  
There was a long, long moment of silence. Everyone waited, the signal's ambient noise could be heard in the background, they could hear the sounds of the computers on board the little ship, the faint whine of the engines. The only thing they didn't hear was a voice.  
  
Finally, the Captain of the Enterprise decided to break the silence himself, "Pavel", he said gently. "Please answer."  
  
Uhura's board bleeped at her, "He's sending visual, Captain."  
  
"On screen, Uhura." Kirk said quietly and turned back to the forward screen.  
  
The screen wavered for just a second and when the image solidified, it was meant by silence from the Enterprise bridge crew, as though even breathing too loud might shatter the brittle, frail being that finally looked up at them.   
  
Still bloody, still in the grip of the few minutes hours ago where he had walked into a hotel room and found a woman he once thought he loved, found her dying, found her....found her.....  
  
His face twitched and the tears slid down it, washing away some of her blood and then the damn broke and he sobbed uncontrollably, lowering his head to the control panel of the little ship.  
  
Kirk whispered to Sulu, "Can we get a tractor on him?" Sulu glanced at his board and then nodded, "Do it." Kirk said.  
  
"Pavel," he said to the image on the screen. "Cut your engines, Pavel. We'll bring you home.....okay?"  
  
Chekov didn't look up but his hand reached out and cut the engine power to the little craft and Sulu nodded his acknowledgment, "I've got him, sir." he said, embarrassed as his voice cracked.  
  
Kirk put a hand on the helmsman's shoulders, "Good. Good."  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Sulu maneuvered the little ship into the hanger bay as slowly, as gently as he could. He set it down so softly it's occupant didn't realize his journey was over.  
  
Two men waited outside the pressure doors for the signal that they could enter. As soon as they got it, they slipped through the doors and strode toward the little craft.  
  
Kirk thumbed the ship's hatch open and signaled for McCoy to go in first. McCoy ducked through the small doorway and made his way through the dimly lit little runner to the cockpit.  
  
He hesitated, seeing it's pilot just sitting staring straight ahead. The doctor was about to step forward when Chekov said, without turning, "I'm all right."  
  
McCoy didn't move for a moment, then said quietly, "I guess the owner of this thing kind of wants it back right away."  
  
His comment was met with silence. Then, Chekov stood up and faced the doctor. "I am fine. I need to get cleaned up."  
  
McCoy nodded to him and stepped aside when Chekov made a move to go past him to the hatch.  
  
Chekov stopped when he saw Kirk, "I'm sorry, Captain. I....I...."  
  
Kirk stopped him with a gesture. "It's all right, Ensign. Just go with McCoy for now."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Ensign?"  
  
"Captain, I'm not sick. I don't need a doctor. I need to go to my quarters and get cleaned up and then I need to talk to Security. I....I am fairly sure I know why.....why, why this....happened."  
  
"What's going on, Ensign?" Kirk asked.  
  
But McCoy interjected, "Jim, it can wait a little while longer, can't it?"  
  
"I don't know. Can it Ensign? We aren't allowing somebody get away time, are we?"  
  
Chekov stared at Kirk for a long moment and then shook his head slowly.  
  
McCoy, confused, frowned, looking from one to the other, but he wasn't confused about one thing. He didn't like the colour of the young man's face beneath the blood.   
  
"Pavel, why don't you come to sickbay, get checked out?" he asked quietly.  
  
"They checked me on Iqualuit. It's a little concussion. I feel fine. I'm tired. I'm....I need to get cleaned up. But, I don't need to be in sickbay."  
  
"Now, son..."   
  
Chekov pierced him with a look, "Look, I appreciate your concern. But, if it were Sulu or Uhura or Scotty you wouldn't be insisting on sickbay." The intensity of his gaze hardened. "I am not that fragile."  
  
"Pavel, a terrible thing has....." Kirk began.  
  
"I know that." Chekov interrupted him. He spoke quietly and with tight control. He turned away and focused on some point only he could see and told them what was there. "I saw her. I held her while she died. She was...she knew she was dying....she was terrified...." he looked down suddenly and pulled the sleeve of his hockey jersey up. There were marks on his arm, He studied them as though they were some sort of new bacteria under a microscope. "That's where she...she was gripping my arm, staring up at me, she couldn't talk. She was so scared." He looked up at Kirk then, meeting his gaze strongly, "I know a terrible thing happened. I saw it. And, it was my fault."  
  
Kirk could see the determination in his navigator's eyes "Okay." he relented, and cut off McCoy's protest with a single glance. "Can you be ready in an hour?" Chekov nodded and Kirk ordered that, "We'll have a formal debriefing in Briefing Room 2 in an hour then. Do you want anybody with you, right now?"  
  
Chekov shook his head, "No. Thank you, sir."  
  
"All right." Kirk held up a jacket. Chekov took it, put it on and did it up, covering the bloody jersey. McCoy handed him a cloth and he wiped his face. He couldn't very well wander the corridors with Landon's blood all over his face. The crew were upset enough as it was.  
  
"We'll walk with you." McCoy offered, taking the cloth from him. There was still blood in his hair but it was hard to see and anyway nothing much could be done about that right now.  
  
"Is that necessary?" Chekov asked and saw the doctor's shoulders slump and decided to acquiesce to this one request from the physician. "All right, then."  
  
"I'll go set up the debriefing." Kirk wanted to say something else to him, he wasn't sure what, so he said, lamely, he thought, "I'm sorry, Pavel."  
  
Chekov looked at him and swallowed, "So am I, Captain."  
  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Chekov had to admit the doctor had been on his best behavior. He didn't fuss over him at all on the walk to his quarters. That would have driven him mad at this point. He didn't question him, just walked quietly beside him, offering silent support for which Pavel felt profoundly grateful at that moment. But, he didn't, he couldn't thank McCoy just then, if he'd started to, he might have broken down again and he had a job to do. He had to keep his wits about him now. He had to, for her.  
  
He turned the shower on. He was using real water, he didn't have many of those rations left but if there was ever a time he needed scalding water pounding his body, this was it.  
  
He had hurried through his quarters, he didn't want to see anything of hers before he made it to the shower.  
  
Now, he stood under the spray and stared at the red swirls in the water and felt incredibly dizzy and then he felt...damn it....he leaned against the wall under the onslaught and slid down it....he was going to....he threw up and the smell of the vomit rising in the steam made him wretch again and he threw himself out of the shower and stood there....freezing in the coolness of his quarters and then he felt shaky again and as his head surged in sick circles he made it to his bed and burrowed into the warmth under the blankets and he curled up and cried himself to sleep.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
What was that noise? He moaned as it continued, intruding on his oblivion with ever more insistent screeches.   
  
And then, "Pavel. Pavel, wake up!"   
  
Chekov did as he was told and found McCoy's face floating over him. "Now what did I do?" he said, before he was fully awake.  
  
"What?" McCoy asked. "You overslept."  
  
"I did?" Chekov was very confused. "For what?" And then, "Oh....oh, ya...oh....some days it doesn't pay to wake up."  
  
"Are you okay?"  
  
"I got sick." he admitted.   
  
"Oh..."  
  
McCoy sat on the bed beside him and got his tricorder out, clucking at the readings there. "Well, it's no wonder. I'm going to give you some electrolytes, a vitamin shot, I want you to drink some water and eat something. And, I want you to get some sleep. I'll tell the Captain he'll have to hold off on the briefing for a few hours."  
  
"Okay." his patient agreed.  
  
"No argument?"  
  
"No. I feel like shit."  
  
"Sorry. Sure you don't want to come down to sickbay?"  
  
Chekov shook his head, realizing too late that it was a mistake. He grimaced and McCoy gave him a questioning look. "No, I don't want to come to sickbay, Okay?"  
  
"Okay. Do you want some company? Sulu and Uhura are very worried."  
  
"They're always very worried." He didn't mean for it to sound that way, he was about to apologize but said instead, "I'm so tired. I just want to sleep. Is that okay?"  
  
McCoy double checked his readings. "Ya, it's fine. The concussion was very mild. I'll give you something for that headache, which you should have told me about." The doctor berated him.  
  
  
Chekov didn't answer him and it was obvious he was thinking of something,   
"What?" McCoy asked.  
  
"Is...have they sent Martha....is she here or still on...."  
  
"Still on Iqualuit."   
"Please, Dr. McCoy. I...want to bring her home in a shuttlecraft. I don't want her beamed up. She needs to be brought home like a person. Not beamed up like a piece of cargo."  
  
McCoy could certainly relate to the sentiment and he smiled at his young patient. "I'm sure we can arrange something."  
  
"Could you....could you ask Sulu, for me, to fly the shuttle? I would but...I'm so tired."  
  
"Sure."  
  
"You don't think the Captain will mind?"  
  
"I don't think so."  
  
Chekov snuggled deeper into his down filled pillow and closed his eyes, "Thank you." he whispered as he drifted off again.  
  
~~~~~~~~~  
  
"It's a nice ship." Commander Racansky commented from her place at the briefing room table. Her comment echoed around the silent room. She cleared her throat, uncomfortable until Scott said, "Ach, ye've a good eye lass, been on a few have ye?"  
  
"A few...I've seen plans for a new class, big thing..."  
  
Scotty made a sound that made McCoy wonder if something wasn't about to come spurting out his nose, "Gak! Look like great wallowing pregnant ducks, do they, ugly as..."  
  
He cut himself off and the others around the table, Kirk, Spock, Security Chief Lt. Suzanne Strevens, Sulu and Uhura all looked expectantly to the door as it whisked open.  
  
Sulu and Uhura visibly tensed. They hadn't seen their friend since they'd all beamed down for their shore leave and stood in the central square of Iqualuit laughing and joking, mostly about the Russian's inability to contain his excitement over the prospect of a good rough and tumble hockey game.  
  
He entered the room alone and stopped just inside the door. The weight of the last few hours was plainly visible on him, still pressing down, and it wasn't difficult to see the inner battle he waged to stay upright. He met his Captain's eyes and Kirk smiled faintly at him. "Mr. Chekov, have a seat, please."  
  
Chekov moved to the only empty seat around the table. He was seated between Uhura and Sulu, to Sulu's right, and he knew it was on purpose and he was grateful to Kirk for thinking of that. He didn't look at his friends. He couldn't just yet. He had to focus on why he was here....and not on what had happened.  
  
"Ensign Chekov, you remember Commander Racansky."  
  
Chekov looked at the woman. Her face was not without sympathy but she managed to convey a tinge of irritation with him and he addressed it with a simple, "I'm sorry about leaving, Commander."  
  
"That's all right, Ensign. You taught us a lesson."   
  
"All right, Chekov. What's going on?" Kirk asked.  
  
Chekov took a breath. It was the first time he said the words, "Martha's....death...." he cleared his throat and then said clearly, looking Kirk in the eye, "...was my fault, sir"  
  
"In what way?"   
  
"It was warning, to me."  
  
"From who? Why?"  
  
Chekov cleared his throat again and shifted in his chair. He put his hands on the table and fidgeted for a second. "My cousin is with group." He bit his lip, blew out a breath, and muttered something under his breath.  
  
"Chekov." Kirk said softly, "Try to relax....just focus on telling us what you know. That's all you have to do right now. Go ahead." McCoy looked at the Captain as though he'd just sprouted a halo...the doctor had his patient protection radar set on high alert and he was waiting for an outburst from his volatile Captain. This level of restraint was almost unprecedented. McCoy's respect for the Captain's skills went up another notch.  
  
It seemed to work for Chekov too, he visibly collected himself and spoke calmly. "They are called 'The Muscovites'. Led by monk, Father Grigory..." Chekov snorted, "That is what Rasputin's name was ...Father Grigory."  
  
Kirk let his navigator talk without interrupting him with questions and the others followed their Captain's lead.   
  
"My cousin, Natalia Federovna is one of them...."  
  
Sulu reacted to this news. He'd liked Natalia a great deal when he'd met her, so much so that Pavel was worried about an attraction between the two. They hit it off two years ago when they'd met at Chekov's family's dacha outside St. Petersburg.   
  
"It is cult....very dangerous...I... know that is who...killed...Martha...." He choked a bit and looked down at the table, fighting for control.  
  
Kirk waited for him to go on and after a few seconds, he did. "They believe that Russian culture, Russian society, Russian people have been contaminated by outside...they want isolation and they want a return to, not only Czarist ways but peasant life, they reject technology....uhm....they have twisted Russian Orthodoxy and set up Father Grigory as a Czar. They have colony on Sevklek 7, is compound, guarded...uhm....they have killed people who try to leave..."   
  
He reached for a glass of water and drank half of it. He set the glass on the table very softly and lowered his head for a moment. His bangs fell into his eyes and he tossed his head slightly and his voice now took on an edge of hatred that spoke of darkness no person would wish to enter. "They kill anything in their way. They don't care. You remember old Italian Mafia? They had rules. Don't touch family. Old Russian Mafia? Kill everything. Wives. Children. Mothers. Grandmothers. Dogs. Cats. Kill them all, that is fear. Fear is control. That's 'The Muscovites.' They'll kill anything. Anyone. And, that's why it's my fault....Martha....died....it was warning, to me. Stay away. Forget Natalia. It was my fault." He said with finality. And, then he leaned back in his chair, he'd said all he would at that point. He looked at the faces across from him and could tell Scotty had a question, he raised his eyebrows at the engineer. "Yes?"  
  
"Lad," Scotty said quietly, "How ken ye be sure 'The Muscovites' were responsible and not some random act of robbery or violence?"   
  
"The icon. On her face. It was enough itself. Russians did it." He stopped for a moment as those words echoed in his mind Russians did it. He closed his eyes for a moment and concentrated very hard.   
  
"But, more than that. Icon was St. Paul. My name Saint. She died because of me." His voce wavered and he took in a shuddering breath and put his hands up to his face. He whispered, "I can't believe it....I can't believe it....."   
  
Sulu put his hand on his friends shoulder and leaned toward him, "Pav...." his voice was breaking. Uhura knew better and she wasn't surprised when Chekov shrugged the helmsman off with an apologetic, "Not now....I can't...I'll fall apart and I have to ....I have more to say....."  
  
He sniffed and said, "I took that ship, I took off, I was going to Sevklek but I know is too late because men who did it, they have martyred themselves already."  
  
"Killed themselves?" Kirk asked. Chekov nodded and the Captain asked, "How do you know?"  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"O God of spirits and of all flesh, Who Takest of Thine own unto Thine own:  
  
Who has said, All souls are Mine and Who callest them and keepest them till the day of Resurrection;  
  
Thyself, O Master, deliver the soul of Thy servant....Martha Elizabeth Landon,..."  
  
  
Pavel Chekov spoke the words of the prayer in Standard for the benefit of his companion. Uhura sat in her seat and watched him as he prayed in the quiet of the shuttlecraft's interior. She was glad he'd asked her to accompany him. He required nothing of her, he said, only her company, it wasn't necessary for her to pray for Martha with him.   
  
"Pavel, I have prayed for her already. Today, if it's all right with you, I'll just stand by for you." His face twitched a little and his eyes shimmered as he nodded a small 'thank you' to her.  
  
Although Sulu was busy at the controls of the little craft, Uhura knew their pilot could hear his friends prayer and she felt the reverence with which he flew this particular mission.  
  
Her attention went back to Chekov when he hesitated in his prayer and she watched him quietly for a moment. He was knelt beside her coffin, his eyes closed, his head bowed.   
  
His fingers gripped the edge of the ditanium tube that held the body of his lover and for a moment, just a moment, he felt an overwhelming urge to rip the seals from the cover and pull her out of there....the crazy idea that she must be suffocating in there made his head swim and he realized he was holding his breath and....Chort!  
  
He sucked in air and his concentration narrowed to an intense beam of light that cut through the chaos crowding his mind, his heart, his soul. He blew the confusion away, imagined it incinerated by the white hot energy of his intensity until his focus centred and he found his voice once more.  
  
"...whom Thou hast taken to Thyself, from every action of the enemy power;   
  
Set as guides for them, Angels of Peace, propitiously grant them to see Thy countenance;  
  
Overlook their misdeeds in this life, whether voluntary or involuntary;  
  
Make them worthy of the portion of Thy Saints and establish them in the bosom of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, The righteous ones, when grief..."  
  
His focus fractured on him again, it was too difficult in Standard.  
  
This time when he spoke it was in Russian and Uhura realized, when she heard the name, 'Masha...' that he was speaking quietly to Martha.  
  
Uhura found herself staring at the embroidery on the cuffs of Pavel Chekov's dress uniform. She studied the high black Russian boots, the white silk shirt and distracted her mind by trying to remember the first time she had seen him in them and then her heart seized. It was the same night she had met Martha Landon.  
  
The Christmas Party in Sciences. Pavel Chekov was 'holding court' as Sulu and she liked to tease. He was surrounded by a group of people that comprised mostly young women, telling them some ridiculous, but always funny, story.  
  
She had thought, when she saw him walk in the room in his Russian dress uniform, how dashing he looked! She smiled now as she watched him, and then jumped when a hand touched her arm, "Sorry, Uhura..." It was Lt. Judy Crowther, an old friend from way back and she had a young Yeoman with her that Uhura didn't know.  
  
"Lt. Uhura, I'd like you to meet Yeoman Landon. Martha's just come on board, yesterday!"  
  
"Just in time for the Christmas Party, I'd say that was pretty good timing, Yeoman." Uhura held out her hand and thought, 'She looks like a ballerina.' She was so blonde and pale she almost looked transparent. But, she had a ready, if somewhat shy, smile.  
  
"Nice to meet you Lt. Uhur..." the girl froze and Uhura wondered if she'd some medical problem, she looked stricken as she gripped Uhura's hand.  
  
And, then she realized the girl was looking over her right shoulder and Uhura turned her head and she didn't have to turn it very far to see that she was staring at Chekov.  
  
"Would you like to meet him?" Uhura grinned slyly. God, she loved matchmaking! Especially the Russian navigator, who had threatened her on pain of death to stop it! That's why he was so much fun to set up. That and the fact he was such a hopeless romantic and Uhura had to admit she lived a bit of vicarious thrill watching him court the girls she sent his way. She didn't have to push them too hard, Uhura laughed to herself as she watched Landon's eyes seemingly unable to shift even a little off the object of her desire.  
  
"Yeoman, would you like to meet him?"  
  
"Hmm? I...oh, I'm sorry....I....." Uhura could she was embarrassed but her brain was being overridden by more basic instincts and so she asked, "Who is he?"  
  
"Ensign Pavel Chekov. He's our Alpha shift navigator."  
  
Her eyes widened, "Oh." and then she didn't say anything and Crowther and Uhura shook their heads....ah, to be so young again you were struck dumb by the sight of a guy!   
  
Uhura blinked rapidly and drew in a slow steady breath. She had to leave those memories behind right now or she would lose herself in them and she wanted to be present for the young man in front of her now.  
  
She looked at him again and thought how she never imagined to see him in this dress uniform under these circumstances. She felt herself sinking into the grief again and tried to centre herself by studying that embroidery again....now she followed the line of blue thread, now the red, and she concentrated on those minute details feeling, as he continued to speak softly in Russian, that she was intruding on a private moment and so she continued to concentrate on all those little details on his uniform. All the little Russian details of his dress uniform and then, 'It must be killing him that Russians did this!'  
  
It had been a dreadful blow to the crew. Martha was popular, well, with most, Uhura knew some thought her a bit of a snob, but Uhura knew she was shy and insecure and that her looks made her appear aloof and her quiet and reserve in public made her appear superior.  
  
Ensign Reiko Lee knew her though. Reiko was her roommate and she had come to love Martha Landon. Uhura shivered at the memory of seeing Reiko after she had beamed back aboard with Sulu when the crew were recalled.  
  
The girl was devastated and she had to return to those quarters where Martha lived. Uhura thought she heard that someone had taken her in for the night...she hoped that was right. Well, at least Uhura would be able to help Reiko through this. The Ensign was a communications trainee after all.   
  
Uhura drew in a breath and thought that the air in the little craft was decidedly cold today. She shivered and set her mind about distracting itself again. She didn't want to think about Martha right now, maybe it was wrong, but she was here for Pavel today. And, she wanted to be strong for him. She had cried for Martha already, and would again, and for him too. But now right now. Not here.  
  
When he began speaking Standard again, she blinked herself back to the here and now as he recited, "Pray to God for me, O Saint Paul, well-pleasing to God, for I readily recommend myself to you, who are the speedy helper and intercessor for my soul."  
  
Uhura's heart clenched again as he finished this prayer and opened his eyes. He stared at the shiny tube imprisoning the body of her....he knew her soul was gone, he didn't really know where, he was taught that she was with God, Sulu believed that she was on her way to a new incarnation, he wasn't sure what Uhura believed, perhaps they would talk about it later, in front of a warm fire.  
  
He bowed his head again and closed his eyes, "O saint of God, Paul, pray to God for me, for my home and my family. And pray for my friends here today and.... watch over them for me..."   
  
He sat back on his heels suddenly and, looking straight ahead at the gleaming perfection of Martha's coffin, he had a vision of her parents in Honolulu watching it materialize before them in the funeral home and '...watch over....them......watch..." he repeated and he felt himself collapsing inside, the walls of control turned to dust and slid down to the ground and took him with them and he turned to Uhura, stricken, and she swept down like an angel of mercy and put her arms around him and they wept all the way home.   
  
By the time the shuttle touched down in the Enterprise Hangar Deck Pavel Chekov had collected himself again. Still, the navigator's appearance was somewhat shocking to his Captain as Kirk met the somber party on the deck at their return home.  
  
It was nothing Kirk could specifically point out. It was not that he could say he had obvious lines or shadows under his eyes, or that his face was gaunt or that he was pale or looked particularly tired, but the cumulative effect of the minute traces of the weight he bore had caused such a shift in his appearance Kirk regretted not having McCoy at his side.  
  
He nodded briefly to Sulu and Uhura who stood close on either side of Chekov and then turned to Pavel, "Ensign." he said softly, and then paused, considering what he wanted to say, "Thank you for suggesting the shuttlecraft. It was very appropriate."  
  
Chekov couldn't bring himself to say anything and Kirk continued with more practical concerns, "There have been some developments in the investigation and we need you to come to a briefing right now."  
  
Chekov asked, meeting his Captain's eyes for the first time, "Developments?"  
  
Kirk felt the impact of the emotional wreckage in the depths of Pavel Chekov's brown eyes and he cleared his throat before he said, "I'm afraid I don't have all the details myself." He made a move to leave the hangar deck and his crew followed him through the pressure doors and then Chekov hesitated and turned back to watch the cargo crew offload Martha's casket from the little ship. He seemed to lose track of where he was until Sulu put a hand on his shoulder and Pavel finally slipped through the door and did not look back as it closed behind them.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~  
  
The group in the briefing room, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Chekov, Strevens and a security guard standing by the door, were quiet as Commander Sandra Racansky explained her findings.  
  
"There was a witness in the hallway of the Inn, another guest, a woman who heard Martha talking to someone at the door to room 12. This witness did not see who Martha was talking to, she was at the other end of the hallway around a corner, but she distinctly heard Yeoman Landon say, "So, change your mind?"  
  
She looked at Chekov who frowned, trying to reason out who she could have said such a thing too and it didn't take him long to figure it out, "Boris!"  
  
"Who?" Kirk asked.  
  
Chekov's voice rose as the words tumbled out rapidly in his excitement, "Boris Yakolev! He played hockey with us! He came back to Inn after game, he was looking for, was meeting somebody there, I asked him, did he want drink? He came to our room but after only few minutes he said he had to go. He was dilithium miner he said, only there two days."  
  
"Boris Yakolev?" Commander Racansky asked as she checked her hand held computer, "No record of anyone by that name on Iqaluit. Could you i.d. him from a photo?"  
  
"Yes, Boris Ivanovitch Yakolev....." Chekov's voice trailed off and he closed his eyes for a second, seemed to waver a bit, McCoy reached out to him but Chekov opened his eyes again, "He was clean shaven, and he had cut on his chin....shaving cut....he must have been one of them...."  
  
"Because he would not have been used to shaving....and would have used an old fashioned razor." Spock explained.  
  
Chekov looked up at the Vulcan. He hadn't spoken to Spock since any of this happened. He and the First Officer had been in the middle of a very interesting long term math project when.....he held the Vulcan's eyes now and saw in them the detached sort of compassion that always seemed to calm him when he was around Spock. Sulu told him that Spock had a Buddha like quality that he wasn't sure was a Vulcan trait or a specifically Spock trait. Chekov felt it was Spock's alone because of the inner battle he fought, the balance he so rigidly maintained. Chekov had met other Vulcan's, they did not have Spock's quality of intellectual compassion.  
  
He smiled faintly at Spock, "Yes, sir."   
  
Kirk looked confused and Spock spoke up, glancing at Chekov in a way that let him know that he could relax for the moment, Spock would explain to the Captain.  
  
"The Muscovites do not shave their beards and since they do not believe in technology, a razor or other primitive implement would have been used, without a practiced hand."  
  
"So he cut himself." McCoy concluded.  
  
Chekov winced, a memory of the horrible wounds Martha had suffered burned into his mind and he saw his hand closed over her abdomen, trying to squeeze the flesh there together, trying to keep the wound from gaping farther open.... trying to literally hold her together....he let out a breath and leaned over the table as his vision started to collapse into a narrow tunnel and he was suddenly terrified he was going to get sick, right here, he was going to throw up on the briefing room table and the terror of that idea blew the image of her from his mind and by the time McCoy was speaking quietly to him, an arm draped around his shoulder, a glass of water pushed into his hand, it was almost over and he took a sip of the water and thought he was okay as he put it back down but McCoy had to catch the glass as it left his hand still well above the table top, which Chekov couldn't see anymore.  
  
There was a funny buzzing noise and it took Pavel a moment to realize it was voices and they were coming from above him and....he was on the floor, McCoy leaning over him, applying a cold wet cloth to his face and a hypo to his arm and the buzzing softened and became, "....Pavel....there you are....hello, you're okay, you just passed out....."  
  
He closed his eyes for a moment and then all at once he felt very good and strong and he knew it was whatever McCoy had pushed into him with the hypo. The nausea was gone, his vision was clearing, the buzzing was now definitely voices, well McCoy's voice, "Hey, you still there?"  
  
Chekov nodded and opened his eyes.   
  
"Feel better?"  
  
Chekov nodded but could tell from the doctor's face that he wanted a more positive confirmation so he said, as strongly as he could, "Yes, I feel much better." And, to his surprise, it was true and so there seemed to be no reason to stay down here on the floor.  
  
He sat up and McCoy and some other guy, oh, it was the Captain, helped him into his chair and then, with the nausea gone, when the confusion left and his head cleared there was embarrassment.  
  
"I'm sorry..." he started to apologize.  
  
"It's all right, Ensign. Don't worry, it's completely understandable. Sure you feel like continuing?" Kirk asked, concern in his voice and his eyes.  
  
Chekov nodded, "Yes. I want to....I want to." and accepted the cup of coffee McCoy put in his hand, he closed his fingers around it, soaking in the warmth from the cup.  
  
Kirk looked to Commander Racansky who smiled sympathetically at Chekov, she had seen the crime scene, had seen Martha's wounds and thought the young man's reaction to the situation not only understandable, but appropriate.   
  
"Ensign Chekov, we've found somebody you need to speak to, I've brought him aboard the Enterprise. He's a former member of 'The Muscovites' and he has information about why Yeoman Landon was murdered." She looked at the Captain then, and then at the doctor and Kirk could see that she was trying to figure out the best way to approach this aspect of the investigation.  
  
"Ensign, it has been my sad duty many times in the past to debrief victims of violence, it's never easy, for them, or for me....and in this case....a young woman murdered in such a violent manner.....I'm sorry....I'm not sure you're strong enough to continue this just now but I need for you to try to be strong enough, okay?"  
  
Chekov met her eyes and did not blink, or flinch away as he simply said, "Commander, I have survived a lot more than you know. And, it hurts me. I am emotional person, I know that. Is not easy, but it is who I am. Just because I don't hold it back, because I express it, doesn't mean I can't take it. If you think you are going to hurt me by inferring that Martha was killed because of me, you are wrong. I know that already. She would not have been killed if she hadn't been with me. So, continue, please."  
  
Racansky nodded to the security guard at the door and he left the room for a moment. Lt. Strevens, uncharacteristically quiet to this point spoke up, "Commander, how can you be sure this person has really left 'The Muscovites' and isn't here to pass on misinformation?"  
  
"That's a good question, Lt." Racansky acknowledged. "We've spoken to the young man's family and he's been in contact with them, for the first time in seven years. A psychiatrist who saw him on Starbase 17 is sure of his veracity, he bears all the post traumatic disorder apparently associated with severing ties with a cult."  
  
Strevens seemed satisfied with that answer and nodded to the Captain, "Sounds all right. I still think we should take everything he says with a grain of salt."  
  
"Noted." Kirk replied as the doors to the briefing room parted and a thin young man entered. Kirk couldn't begin to guess his age - he could have been twenty, he could have been forty. His corn coloured hair appeared to sprout from his head in an unruly thatch the consistency of straw. His face was clean shaven. And, it bore the cuts of clumsiness.  
  
The security guard led the young man to the seat at the end of the table and he moved across to it with quick, jerky movements like a jittery bird. He sat but couldn't keep still and his hands wrung around themselves constantly as his face worked while he chewed his lip.  
  
"Captain Kirk, this is Constantine Sergeivich Ulyanov."  
  
"Mr. Ulyanov, thank you for speaking with us today." Kirk said.  
Ulyanov cleared his throat but didn't speak, merely nodding quickly, his eyes flitting from one person around the table to the next and then locking on the Russian navigator. "Pavel Andreivich." he said suddenly.  
  
Chekov stared at him, "I don't know you."  
  
"No." Ulyanov said shortly, quickly. "No. I know you."  
  
"How?"  
  
"I know you.... uh huh....do you know....." Ulyanov leaned forward, his hands clasped over the table, "I do...I.....have seen....we have, some of us have....."  
  
"Kostya!" Commander Racansky suddenly barked, surprising everyone, especially Chekov who had no idea she was familiar enough with the young man to use the casual diminutive of his name. "Focus, Kostya....one thing at a time...where did you see Pavel Chekov's photo?"  
  
"Sev....on Sev I saw it...."  
  
"Where on Sev?" Racansky pressed, obviously she was used to his scattered concentration.  
  
"In the office....in the office, the Count's office."  
  
"Count who?"  
  
"Count Shirovsky's office, in there it was, his photo, in there - not to be hurt, not to be hurt but....oh.....oh, but......"  
  
"But what, Kostya?"  
  
"Make him understand, yes."  
  
"Make him understand what?"   
"Stay away from Sev....don't come to Sev....."  
  
"Kostya...." the young man didn't look at her, he was shaking his head and he leaned down close to the table and put his fingers on it and then watched while he drew an invisible pattern there and then he was writing with his fingers on the table....and he started whispering, in Russian, and Strevens turned the recorder on the terminal on but Pavel Chekov didn't need to wait to hear a translation.  
  
"Warn him off. Cut the girl. Cut her. Kill her, all the better, kill her he'll get the message. Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut...."  
Chekov lunged across the table and had Ulyanov by the collar before anyone could move, he dragged the young man across the table, he wasn't even trying to hurt him, just shut him the hell up!  
  
"Pavel! Let go!" McCoy had hold of his wrists, Strevens pulled the terrified, shrieking Ulyanov back into his seat.  
  
"I'm sorry!" Chekov panted, "I just...had to shut him up! Stop saying that!!"  
  
Ulyanov covered himself, cowering like a beaten dog, Chekov covered his eyes to the sight, he'd seen it before, he'd lived it as a child, covering up, cowering before his father's rage and he couldn't stand to see that he'd caused another human being the same kind of terror.  
  
"Everyone calm down!" Kirk shouted. And, then more calmly, "Mr. Ulyanov we thank you for speaking to us, please excuse Mr. Chekov, it has been very upsetting."  
  
"They killed her didn't they?" Ulyanov asked, his voice trembling. Chekov took his hands away from his eyes and studied the quaking, miserable creature before him and felt a pang of sympathy and regret.  
  
"Yes." he told Ulyanov quietly and the two men's eyes met - Ulyanov's such a pale ice blue, so like Martha's - such fragility there they looked to be made of thinnest glass, they looked to be ready to shatter any moment. "I'm sorry I grabbed you. I'm sorry." Pavel told him and Ulyanov started to cry.  
  
"The Father, he said you must be kept away. You must forget she who was your cousin. The Czarina, she did not want you harmed, "He must not be harmed!" she said, I heard her, 'I don't care about anyone else, but he must not be harmed.'"  
  
Chekov frowned, trying to sort through what Ulyanov was saying, "What do you mean, 'she who WAS my cousin' and who is the Czarina?"  
  
"Don't you know?" Ulyanov whispered, as though he were speaking in church.  
  
Chekov shook his head, feeling like he was about to sink into a morass of despair that he was unsure he could cope with.   
  
Ulyanov looked around the table, dumbfounded for a second, "Don't any of you know? How could you not know who the Czarina is? Everybody in the world knows who the Czarina is....the Empress Natalia...."  
  
Chekov suddenly felt so exhausted he didn't believe his bones could hold up his body anymore and he slumped and put his hands into his face as a groan escaped him.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
There hadn't been any great urgency in doing an autopsy on the body inside the ditanium coffin. It was obvious what killed her. Still, it was done, part of procedure, one of the rules, forms had to be filled out, assessments confirmed, a chain of command had to be informed and now that it was over Pavel Chekov tried not to think about what other barbarities had been committed to that body....one that he knew so well....he felt dizzy thinking about it, his mind spun with a kalaidescope of intimate imagery, the little mole on her left shoulder, the scar on her right kneecap she'd never had repaired, it wasn't big, it wasn't an ugly mark, just a little two inch white ridge that marked the place where she had tripped and fallen to her knees when she was 14 and out walking on volcanic rocks on the coast of Hawaii. He loved that body....the skin so soft, the arms that welcomed him and loved him and the tears that tracked down his face now were as much for the love he couldn't find for her as for that which she held in her heart for him.   
  
He heard the door open behind him and was shocked by it. It couldn't be time yet!  
  
The Captain's hand landed on his shoulder, "Pavel, it's time."  
  
He had just gotten here he thought, but now the Captain was telling him he'd been here all night and all day and it was early evening now and time for the rest of the Enterprise crew to mourn her and he started to get off his knees and Kirk had to help him, he'd been on his knees for hours....he could spend the rest of his life on his knees and it wouldn't erase the blame he carried inside him for the snuffing out of Martha Landon's life.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~  
  
He was aware of people watching him enter the ship's chapel. He was aware of his friends sitting close. He was aware of how bright the lights in the room seemed. He was aware of a voice speaking and thought perhaps he should listen but he couldn't turn his mind to it and he just sat quietly watching the reflections in the ditanium tube's shining surface and wondered how long it would be before he could sleep because he was so tired his consciousness was rushing in and out like waves crashing a stormy reef.  
  
And then people were standing and he stood too but didn't feel his legs under him and didn't really hear what anyone was saying and then Ensign Reiko Lee was in front of him and he was surprised by how contorted her face looked and then her arm was moving and her hand hit him in the face so hard it shattered the numb cocoon he was in with a blinding bolt of white light and he was right there now as she screamed at him, "You should have let her go! You know you didn't love her! You know you didn't! You killed her! You bastard!"   
  
And then, people were dragging her away and out of the room and he realized he was leaving the room too and he looked to his right and it was Uhura and he looked to his left and it was Sulu and they moved down the corridor and his legs must have been working but it was like they were flying just above the floor, he couldn't feel it at all and then he was in Uhura's quarters and it was so warm and he felt so sleepy and he just wanted to close his eyes but they didn't seem to want that.  
  
"Pavel! Can you hear me!" Sulu's face was so close he could feel his breath as he, he was yelling and now he was shaking him and can't he see I'm too tired to answer, I can't.....I can't.....I...... and then he was falling and falling and it was such a relief.....  
  
...until something on his face was irritating him and he slapped at it with his hand and heard a female voice say, "Ensign Chekov.....Pavel wake up....." and he knew that voice and knew it wouldn't give up so he opened his eyes and saw what he expected. Chapel's smiling face.  
  
"Tell me I'm not in sickbay." he pleaded.  
  
"You're not in sickbay." she smiled.  
  
"Thank you."  
  
"You're in Uhura's quarters, you passed out again."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Why? Because, Pavel, you've had a terrible emotional shock, because you've been awake for almost seventy hours, except for two four hour naps, because you've barely eaten in three days, because you're dehydrated." She loaded a hypo. He started to protest and she stopped him with a look, "This is doctor's orders. This is it or you go to sickbay, your choice. A tri-ox shot, a B12 shot...." she paused as Sulu set a tray of food down on the small table in the corner of Uhura's quarters, "A meal...." He screwed up his face, "Please, Pavel, try to eat something...at least try....I've got an i.v. kit here and I can hook you up but I don't want to do that." He nodded and she continued, "And sleep, you've got to sleep. The human body can't stay awake this many hours....why do you think sleep deprivation was used as torture? So, stop torturing yourself, okay? If you can't sleep I'll give you a sedative."  
  
He studied her for a moment, knowing from the set of her jaw that she was not going to tolerate any protest on his part and anyway, he felt so lousy he was ready to accept medical help.   
  
He sat up, "Okay..." He looked at the food tray, "I can have that in my...."  
  
Uhura spoke up then, "No, sugar, you stay here tonight...." He was about to ask her why when he realized that he hadn't been in his quarters except to shower and nap and he had pointedly ignored Martha's belongings, they must still be there....Uhura was right, he couldn't face that room tonight.  
  
The Communication's Officer came over to the bed with a big comforter in her arms and presented it to him, "I even have a 'real' blanket for you, honey."  
  
He looked at her and his eyes sparkled at her thoughtfullness and he said, silently, 'Thank you.' and smiled at her as she put it on the end of the bed.  
  
Chapel put an arm around his shoulder as he got up and made his way to the table where Sulu had set out his meal for him. Several of his favorite foods were there, but right now they looked as appetizing as dirt.  
  
He sat down wearily and decided he'd better make an effort anyway and the first mouthful felt like chewing paper but he managed to swallow it and almost laughed when he looked up at the delighted faces of his audience, he thought they looked like a group of anxious parents watching a child feeding itself for the first time.  
  
They must have realized how silly they looked because they all at once had something to do. Uhura got up and spread the comforter over the bed and turned it down. Sulu discovered a piece of lint on the sleeve of his uniform and Chapel busied herself with her medkit.   
  
Pavel Chekov managed to get half his meal down and earned a smile of approval from Chapel and a hug as well before the nurse picked up her kit and said her goodnights to everyone.  
  
Sulu watched Pavel studying the contents of his tea cup for awhile and then stifled a yawn as best he could but the Russian caught it and smiled tiredly at him, "Go to bed Hikaru."  
  
"Oh, I'm fine."  
  
"I'm not. I"m tired." The slurred words illustrated his fatigue as he continued,   
"Thank you for staying....with me."  
  
Sulu's jaw moved and Chekov thought for a moment the helmsman might cry and if he did...."Sulu, please...."   
  
Sulu stood up then, "If you need anything, anything at all, at any time, if you don't call me I'll be really pissed."  
  
Pavel smiled at him and started to get out of his chair, "Don't get up." Sulu said, but the Russian was already standing and Sulu put his arms around him and hugged him so hard and squeezed his eyes shut as he said, "I'm sorry, Pav." and then whispered "It'll be okay, it'll be okay....." and then Uhura put her hands on Sulu's shoulders.  
  
"Come on, honey." she said gently to the helmsman.   
  
And Sulu reluctantly let his friend go and then wanted to apologize if he had got him upset again just as he was going to go to sleep and Chekov could see the regret in his eyes and said quickly, "S'all right. Thank you. I'm fine. Thank you." his words were running together like syrup now.  
  
Sulu nodded, clapped him on the shoulder and swept out of the room as quickly as he could and the door hissed shut again and Chekov let out a breath, "Bozhe moi!"  
  
And then he sank down into the chair again and Uhura put her hands on his shoulders and said quietly, "Come on, sweetie, you need some sleep."  
  
And he got up and used the head and was amazed to see his robe hanging in her bathroom and he wanted to cry at the thoughtfullness of his friends but he just quickly got undressed and went back into the main room.  
  
Uhura had dimmed the lights and turned down the bed and he stood just inside the room for a moment and then said quietly, "I don't think I can sleep....and I"m so tired...."  
  
She walked over to him and took his hand and led him to the bed and he crawled in and she pulled the comforter up over his shoulder and pulled a chair up beside the bed.  
  
She reached for a glass of water and said, "Christine left a sleeping pill fo you, why don't you take it. I'll sit with you till you fall asleep."  
  
"What you goin do? Where you sleep?"  
  
"It's all looked after, here, take your pill, okay, you can hardly speak anymore."   
  
He took the little blue pill from her fingers and popped it in his mouth and it was so tiny he thought the water was unnecessary but took a sip anyway and lay back on the bed and closed his eyes as he sank into the bedding.   
  
He could smell her perfume in the linens and he smiled to himself, he loved Uhura's perfume and then he felt really warm and then his arms and legs felt like he was suddenly in 10 G's they felt so incredibly heavy and then he felt himself floating on a warm sea and then he felt nothing at all.....and that was the best.  
  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
He was surprised when he awoke. Surprised at the warmth he felt on his face, like sleeping in the sun. He opened his eyes slowly, Uhura's sunlamp was shining on him from the ceiling. Surprised that it was morning, that night had passed without nightmare visions, and now he had to turn them aside in the light of day once more.  
  
He stretched and noticed a folded piece of beige stationary on the pillow beside him. He flipped it open and read her neat fluid handwriting,   
  
'Pasha, we are around if you need us. Breakfast?'  
  
Breakfast - like everyday...only this wasn't like everyday. He closed his eyes and burrowed back into the pillow for a moment. If he went back to sleep he could go back to oblivion again....he was temped for a moment...but, no, he felt good this morning. He felt very well rested....very, very well rested....he glanced up at the chronometer - 1345 hrs!   
  
Time to make a move...but what would he do today? He groaned - there were odious chores to do, he could gather her things from his quarters, he could write to her parents....he ran a hand through his hair and decided to just stare at the painting hanging over the bed for awhile. Two leopards looked back at him, the female was sprawled at the male's feet and in a playful gesture she had one large paw pushing against his belly, she was looking at the painter, curious as to who had interrupted their game, the male stood profile, aloof, looking at something in the distance, something far away, something that kept him from her, apart from her, separate, closed....Pavel shook himself. This wasn't working, and then he noticed the smaller line below Uhura's breakfast invitation.  
  
  
'ps: you have messages'  
  
Thank God! Messages. Something he could do, respond to. He wished he had a shift on the bridge but he knew it wouldn't look right, people wouldn't understand that he needed to do something to banish those horrible images from his mind.  
  
He sat up and activated the terminal - there were three intraship messages for him and one from a private yacht called 'Jackie Cochrane', he wondered briefly who Jackie Cochrane was, if they were any relation to Zefram and then he rubbed at his face and took a breath, trying to focus. He wasn't groggy, he was just having so much trouble concentrating.  
  
He gave up for the moment and got out of bed and used the head. He came back into the room, god it was hot in here!, and got a tea from the replicator, then changed his mind and ordered a coffee, something he didn't drink often, but felt he needed...tea was too comforting, it would dull his senses, he needed what he considered the bitterness of coffee to wake him up this morning.  
  
He considered sitting at Uhura's desk to view his messages but....the bed beckoned, he was feeling like a bit of an invalid this morning and wanted to indulge and immediately felt a pang of guilt and stamped it down as best he could. Shit. This was going to take a long, long time....  
  
He climbed into the bed, propped the pillows up (she had a lot of pillows!) accessed his first message and sipped at his coffee as he watched his Captain on the little screen,   
  
"Ensign....Pavel....please come and see me some time today. My schedule is clear for the day up until 1800. If you need anything, please let us know."  
  
Kirk smiled a little smile and managed to look Captainly, concerned, supportive, empathetic, sad, strong, understanding and commanding and encouraging all at once. That always amazed Pavel Chekov, the range of messages he could impart in a single look.  
  
Chekov took a deep breath as all of those emotions from his Commanding Officer swept over him, even from a taped message. He took another sip of coffee, erased the message and forged on ahead. Spock.  
  
'Ensign Chekov, I have completed some adjustments on the third formula that I believe will solve our time problem with the matrix fluctuation. I understand you are not on the duty roster and if you wish to work on the equation I have removed myself from the rota today and tomorrow.'  
  
Spock's serene face looked into the monitor for several seconds before the image vanished and Pavel was surprised to find a tear tracking down his face. Goddamned Vulcan! He could say so much in so little and his compassion touched the chord in Chekov that longed for peace, for quiet, for stillness, for calm, for healing.  
  
He moved on to the third intraship message and Scotty's intense face appeared,   
  
'Lad. I'll be beaming the lass over to the Senegal for the trip home today. We're rendezvousing with Senegal at 1900. I'll transfer her over at about 15 after. It'll just be me ....and you... if you like. Transporter Room One. Ye don't need to call, just show if ye want...'  
  
Scott reached forward to shut the recorder off and then:  
  
'Ye know ye ken call, if ye need, but ye don't have to...if ye don't have to....ah, ye know what I mean!'  
  
The Engineer shook his head at his own fumbling as the image vanished and Pavel smiled. He considered Scotty like a cross between an older brother and an uncle...never a father figure, he was too much fun to party with to be a father figure!  
  
He was about to move on to the extraship message when the computer bleeped at him, he had another message coming in from inside the ship. He answered it.  
  
'Chekov here."  
  
McCoy's face appeared. He looked startled, "Thought I'd get the machine. You okay?"  
  
"Fine."  
  
"Did you sleep all right?"  
  
"Very well, thank you."  
  
McCoy leaned closer to the viewer, peering at him like an old owl. "Well, you look rested. Have you eaten yet?"  
  
Chekov stalled and McCoy glowered at him and Pavel answered quickly, "I just woke up ten minutes ago!"  
  
The doctor's features settled back into a semi-scowl. "Okay." and then softened so much he looked like a portrait somebody might have done of the kindly old country doctor Chekov knew was a favorite character of the Southern fiction that grew out of the Georgia landscape that bred the physician. "Call me if you need anything, ya hear?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Okay." McCoy's face blinked out but not before Chekov heard him mutter under his breath, "Probably just eat a lousy cracke..." Chekov almost laughed as the terminal cut off the rest of his private tirade.  
  
He finished the rest of his coffee, grimacing at the taste of the now lukewarm liquid, and started the last message, the one from the 'Jackie Cochrane'.  
  
It was a woman he'd never seen before. A woman in her thirties or so, he guessed, dark hair, almost black, pretty, with a narrow chin and high cheekbones. Her hazel eyes were intensely intelligent and her sharp features softened when she spoke and when she spoke, she sounded a bit like McCoy, there was a definite slow drawl in her voice.  
  
'Ensign Chekov. Please forgive this intrusion. Your ships surgeon asked me to contact you. I am Doctor Donna Reed. I am a psychiatrist and an expert in cultic relationships. I have been informed of the murder of Yeoman Landon. I am deeply sorry, Mr. Chekov. I am very familiar with The Muscovites and Dr. McCoy thought it might be helpful if we meet. I may be able to help you understand why their followers would go to such extremes when they perceive a threat. I understand it is very soon after this tragedy, but I believe it is prudent and healthier to deal with these issues as soon as possible. If you wish I can meet you on Iqualuit - you may contact me anytime aboard the Cochrane. Again, my condolences, Ensign. Please do not hesitate to call if you need anything."  
  
The woman smiled at him. A practiced smile Chekov thought, but not insincere. It must be strange speaking to someone you've never seen before. Many people would have just sent audio - he liked it that she didn't choose to do that.  
  
His mind had started working the moment she said she was familiar with The Muscovites. He needed to learn all about them. He needed to find out everything he could. He needed to know. It was the only way to become one of them.  
  
~~~~~~  
  
He had believed for a long time in the healing power of ritual. As a child he had ritually cast his father out of his life by writing his name on a piece of paper and lighting it on fire and watching it burn and that had switched something off in him and that had enabled him, at the tender age of six, to move ahead, at least for awhile.  
  
His culture was one steeped in ritual. It grounded him. And he needed it now.  
  
He had entered his quarters warily, he could still feel her presence and for a moment he hovered in the darkened doorway and thought maybe his knees would buckle.  
  
But, they didn't and he walked into the room and very quickly, very deliberately began picking up everything that had belonged to her. He put them on the bed one at a time, dropping them quickly as though they burned his hands.  
  
And when he was done he stood for a long time looking down at the little pile there...silver hairbrush (he loved brushing her hair, so long, so soft, he loved the way it slipped over his fingers, how the weight of it pulled it across his hand like a living thing, like living silk)....a pair of little pearl teardrop earrings she had bought on shoreleave at Starbase 8 (they had argued that day, he remembered, they argued so much, what a waste)....a novel she'd been reading, 'Eden's Tide' by John Sarazan, he didn't know what it was about, he didn't ask her, he hadn't been interested enough to bother....  
  
His knees failed him finally and left him on the floor, weeping, inconsolable, wracked with such waves of guilt and hurt he thought it might kill him, he wished it would, just kill him, just kill him, not her, not her....Bozhe moi!  
  
"Martha!" the wail was torn from him as he felt his heart split in two. Why hadn't he let her go! Why! Oh, God! Her life was over! Her life was over! All that she had wanted, the children she longed for, the family she craved and planned for and visualized and named! Chelsey and Ryan....a girl and a boy, she would teach them to surf and to play the piano and ride horses and draw. And they would spend days on the beach and she would complain about the sand in their clothes and their shoes that would track all over the house when they got home....  
  
...Chelsey and Ryan.... never to be.........   
  
It was too late now! Too late, too late, too late....  
  
He curled up on the floor and descended into a hell he knew all too well and if he'd had a phaser in his hand he'd have pulled the trigger in that moment and if he'd had a knife in his hand his heart really would be split apart and if he'd had strength in his limbs he'd have walked out the nearest air lock and imploded....but he didn't have those things.....what he did have were friends.  
  
"Oh, shit! Pav!" Sulu hauled him up to a sitting position and wrapped his arms around him, "Why the hell are you doing this yourself!"  
  
Pavel Chekov wasn't even sure who it was at first, just a body, a warm body, strong and holding him up and letting him lean against it and he did, he did for awhile and then there was a white flash and his muscles exploded under an onslaught of adrenaline and he was up and moving and striking out and screaming and he heard glass breaking and he heard somebody shouting at him but the adrenaline wasn't spent yet and he couldn't stop smashing, he wanted to smash the whole goddamned universe apart! He wanted to smash the Muscovites! Smash them! Smash the killers! Smash them! Smash their bodies! Smash their faces! Smash them! Smash!  
  
And then....it was gone and he stood at ground zero and looked around at the destruction he had wrought and looked at the face of his friend, Sulu.  
  
Chekov's chest laboured and his breath sounded like an old steam engine in the silent room, the wreckage that had been the mirror above his bookshelf shifted, then slid the last foot to the floor with another loud crash.  
  
Chekov stared at it for a bit and took a bigger breath and slowed the rest after it and felt his head slowly stop the spin and felt the tension bleed out of his shoulders and his back and his arms and he looked at Sulu again and Sulu looked back at him and his expression slowly changed. The helmsman took a breath and his features rearranged themselves and he no longer looked like he expected another bomb to go off any second, his eyebrows went up a little and he cleared his throat.  
  
And, then he cleared it again, and finally, quietly, "I made...I made....borscht."  
  
Pavel Chekov's eyes cast about the room as though looking for the punch line to what his friend had just said. There didn't appear to be one and so he focused on his friend and asked, "Borscht?"  
  
Sulu nodded.  
  
Chekov looked at the floor for a second, at the mess there and then back up at Sulu, who's features once again bore an expression of expectancy, not of disaster, but of hope.  
  
Chekov shrugged and nodded a little and stepped over the glass and the broken picture frames and picked his way across the room and the helmsman put his arm around his buddy's shoulder and led him through the door.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Orders. Orders were orders. Only thing was, these orders weren't particularly important. As a matter of fact, they were downright, well, trivial. And, Kirk sensed, DELIBERATELY unimportant. Enterprise was to be part of a little show parade for a trade delegation from some backwater system with an unpronounceable name but a surplus of mineral sources that had already agreed to do business with the Federation. The I's were dotted and the T's were crossed and this was just a party really to say, 'hey, nice doing business with you.'  
  
Kirk knew what was coming. Chekov had already put in his request for an extended leave on religious grounds - an official mourning period. Kirk had heard rumblings about several others who were about to make that same request and in light of the, well, conveniently 'fluffy' nature of their next mission and the fact that Mr. Scott insisted that a couple of weeks in drydock afterwards was absolutely essential if the ship weren't to blow herself to smithereens or simply fall apart at the seams, the Captain doubted that his command crew would be needed at all in the next few weeks..... he would just have to tell them what he was about to tell Chekov.   
  
Under no circumstances was anyone from Enterprise to go within 3 parsecs of Sevklek 7.   
  
Kirk chewed his lip, a habit his mother tried unsuccessfully to curb from as far back as the Captain could remember. He knew it was a stupid habit but it helped him to think and as he gnawed away he studied the information on his terminal regarding the forbidden planet he knew damn well his navigator and perhaps a few others were determined to get to and he saw something....it was thin.... it was a straw he was grasping at but there it was.  
  
"Well, I'll be damned."   
  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"Can I...." Christine Chapel looked around at the mess in Pavel Chekov's quarters before her gaze settled on the sheepish expression on it's owner's face.  
  
He shrugged at her and gestured her into the room. She carefully picked a path around the debris and made her way to him. "Want some help?" she asked quietly.  
  
He looked at her for a long time, considering her question and all that it contained. He nodded and she smiled at him and put her medical bag down on the top of his desk, abandoning the role of nurse for the role of friend for the time being.  
  
She picked up a mangled picture frame and set it carefully on the top of the desk, in silence, and then she helped him pick up the pieces and they spoke not a word to each other for close to an hour and then the room was presentable again and the pieces that were in need of repair were in a box.....and all of Landon's things were in another box and he looked down into it for a long time before he finally closed the lid and his hands stayed there until she took them in her own warm hands and squeezed them hard.  
  
And, then, she let go of his hands and picked up the box of Landon's belongings and left his quarters with them and he stood staring at the space they had occupied on the desk until the door to his quarters opened again and Christine said, "Don't forget, your meeting with the Captain is in five minutes."  
  
He smiled at her, the lopsided smile, and he blinked at her and she returned the expression and they understood once more that they would always be like this - watching over each other.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"I'm wondering something, Ensign." Kirk set his coffee cup down on his desk and leaned back in his chair, unconsciously mimicking Spock by steepling his fingers thoughtfully in front of him.  
  
Chekov was seated across the desk from him, he hadn't been in the Captain's quarters three times since coming aboard Enterprise and it still felt like a strange place to be, he would be glad when this conversation were over and he could get out of here. "Sir?"  
  
"How did they know where you were? How did they know you were even thinking of going to get her?"  
  
"I didn't hide my feelings about it, Captain. Everyone in my family feels the same way about the Muscovites, about Natalia being with them. They all knew I was planning to go get her. Natalia probably heard it from somewhere, somehow."  
  
"And how did they know you were on Iqualuit? With Yeoman Landon?"  
  
Chekov shrugged, "I don't know, sir. I....never really thought about it."  
  
"I've thought about it." He stood and Chekov felt an urge to jump to his feet, it felt very uncomfortable to be seated while the Captain paced around him.   
  
Kirk turned back toward him, "How fast can you get from Iqualuit to Sevklek 7?"  
  
"Three days at warp 5." Chekov never hesitated, he knew Kirk knew he had already plotted that course several times.  
  
"Three days. And we diverted to Iqualuit four days before Yeoman Landon was murdered....."  
  
"Sir?"   
"They only had a days notice to dispatch the killers."  
  
Chekov thought about that for the first time, "Somebody told them."  
  
"Somebody told them."  
  
"Somebody on Iqualuit?"  
  
"Iqualuit was not told we were arriving until we were two days out - there was a chance we were going to be diverted to Breskka so I didn't tell Uhura to call Iqualuit until I was sure."  
  
"Somebody on Enterprise?"  
  
The Captain stopped in front of Chekov and looked down at him. If Pavel Chekov thought he had felt uncomfortable before he had no inkling of how small he would suddenly feel with his Captain towering over him with a hard expression on his face. "Somebody on Enterprise." Kirk bit the words off. "Somebody on Enterprise called Sevklek 7 and told them we would be on Iqualuit and they were waiting for you. Somebody on Enterprise....." Kirk took a slow breath that mirrored the slow burn he was doing inside.  
  
"But....I don't understand...."  
  
"Neither do I. But, I'm going to." Kirk swore. The Captain sat down across from the Ensign again. "Strevens is checking into the possibilities.....somebody on Enterprise had to tell them, there was no other way for them to know."  
  
"It had to be subspace message..." Pavel reasoned it out aloud, "....it had to be, is only way to....somebody in....."  
  
"Communications."  
  
Chekov didn't voice the name that echoed in his head, he could see by the look on Kirk's face that the Captain was ahead of him. The Russian was about to name the name when the Captain shook his head slightly, "Strevens will let us know."  
  
Kirk reached for the carafe and poured himself another coffee, he made a move to pour Chekov some when he noticed the Ensign hadn't touched his. He spooned three tablespoons of sugar into his cup, Chekov raised his eyebrows at that, catching a glance from the Captain, and a little grin escaped him. Kirk shrugged and Chekov relaxed a little. Until Kirk said, "The Enterprise and her crew, specifically you, have been ordered to stay away from Sevklek 7."   
  
It was what the young officer expected and he made no comment as Kirk continued, "Sevklek is not a Federation world, there is no central government as you know, only several separate settlements on different continents, including the Muscovites on the northern continent. So, that's it, I'm afraid. Starfleet is petitioning the Federation to investigate Yeoman Landon's death and to..."  
  
"It's not necessary. I know who killed her. Who ordered it. Ulyanov said...."  
  
"Ulyanov has disappeared." Kirk said quietly.  
  
Chekov didn't say anything, he swallowed and wondered how many people would die before this was over. And, then he did say, "We have his statement."  
  
"Yes....but the Federation is saying we have no jurisdiction...."  
  
"It happened on Iqualuit, not Sevklev...."  
  
"Ensign you don't need to convince me."  
  
"I'm sorry, sir but it's beginning to sound as if nothing is going to be done and they...they killed her....they killed her..." his voice trailed off as he stared at the floor.   
  
"Ensign, you cannot go to Sevklek 7. Sevklek 7 is completely forbidden to you, do you understand that?"  
  
"Yes, sir." he said automatically, dully.  
  
Kirk snapped, "Don't just say 'yes, sir', do you know what the consequences will be if you disobey that order and go to Sevklek 7?"  
  
Chekov was about to respond when Kirk cut him off, "You are weeks away from your Lieutenant's stripes Ensign. You have an exemplary record. Sevklek 7 could destroy that."  
  
Kirk stared hard at Chekov for a bit and the Ensign realized suddenly the Captain was trying to tell him something.  
  
"Sir?"  
  
"Ensign Chekov, listen to me very carefully. You are under no circumstances to go to Sevklek 7 during your extended leave - or any other time for that matter."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  
"Say it."  
  
"Sir?"  
  
"Repeat my order."  
  
"I am not to go to Sevklek 7 during my leave or any other time."  
  
"You are not to go where?"  
  
"Sevklek 7."  
  
"Sevklek 7. Remember that, Ensign."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  
The Captain stood and gave Chekov a look that made the Ensign jump to his feet. "Mr. Scott is waiting for you."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  
Chekov made a move to the door when the Captain said quietly, "Pavel...."  
  
Chekov turned back.   
  
"Be careful...on your leave."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  
"And tell Sulu and Uhura the same."  
  
Chekov resisted the urge to express his gratitude to his commanding officer and turned quickly and vanished through the door.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
The Chief Engineer of the Enterprise had almost given up on the young man who finally appeared in the transporter room with barely a minute to spare before the scheduled transport. Pavel Chekov didn't say anything to Scott when he entered the room, his eyes locked on to the transporter pad and that damned, all too familiar, gleaming casket, now accompanied by a second smaller ditanium container, addressed to Martha Landon's parents, Richard and Sara.   
  
Chekov approached the platform after nodding a hello to Scott and took a breath before opening the top of the small container of her personal effects. He had an envelope in his hand, a letter he had written to her parents. A letter he had written eight times. It was seven pages long, written carefully in his small, precise script, in Standard of course, which was difficult for him to write easily.   
  
Seven pages long and he could remember every word, every sentence and probably would for the rest of his life for they seemed to him so hopelessly inadequate. He had hoped when he started the letter that his words would offer some comfort, but he knew they really did little more than assuage his own guilt. The letter seemed such a failure on every level he woke several times in the night and found his subconscious mind mulling it over and finally he just lay quietly and thought 'Should I send it?" and his gut instinct said very loudly that yes, he should - and so he did.  
  
He closed the lid and touched the casket below it for a moment. "Dosvedanya, Masha....aloha..." He swallowed and blinked, keeping the tide at bay and stepped back quickly, putting distance between himself and that hideous tube.  
  
He withdrew to stand next to Scott who, Chekov was aware, was looking at him. But, Pavel didn't want to look at him just then, he just wanted that thing on the transporter platform to be gone and he willed the engineer to get on with it.  
  
"Ready to energize." Scott said to the comm system tied in to the waiting freighter.  
  
The answer came back, "Go ahead, Enterprise."  
  
Scotty glanced at Chekov as though waiting for a signal. He got none and so he turned away and slid the controls down the board and the familiar hum started and Chekov only stared at the floor and when he looked up again....it was gone. She was gone. Gone as if she'd never been there. Would he ever accept it?  
  
He felt an arm around his shoulder. "Come on, lad." He felt himself leaving the transporter room as Scotty continued, "You know, there's a little spot, not too far from here in a fast shuttle, lovely little place with great camping. Darius, it's called....course, the Captain tells me not everybody calls it Darius."  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
The call had come into sickbay at 0345 - an attempted suicide. Christine Chapel, normally on the alpha watch, was alone in the sickbay, covering the shift for an ailing Fred Bleeker when the hysterical call had come that someone had cut their wrists open. For one horrible moment she thought it might have been Chekov but the screaming voice on the other end of the comm shouted, 'Lee! It's Reiko Lee!"  
  
Now Ensign Lee was in the sickbay, her friend Judy sitting by her side, her bandanged arms hidden beneath the blankets of her bed.  
  
Her only other visitor had been the Captain. "Please don't tell anyone." the Ensign had cried.   
  
"Tell anyone what?" Kirk said so quietly, so gently to the young woman he barely knew. McCoy stood on the other side of the bed and watched her as Kirk questioned her.  
  
"I...I'm so sorry.....I...didn't mean....I'm just so....ashamed...." She turned away from her Captain then and wished again she hadn't wakened here - or anywhere.  
  
She did not want to live anymore. She did not have that right. She had taken it from her friend Martha.  
  
"Ensign Lee you must tell me what happened." Kirk said with just the right combination of authority and concern.  
  
"I....was bored, it was a month ago, I guess, and I was alone for awhile, it wasn't on Uhura's shift it was, I don't want to get anyone in.....trouble...." her voice trailed off as the word 'trouble' echoed in the empty room, a pale description for what she had caused if Kirk was correct in his guess as to why this young woman had taken a shard of glass to her arms.  
  
"I was just monitoring when I heard a transmission, a sermon, and I thought it sounded.......Russian...." she said the word wistfully and a little smile turned up her mouth, "I listened and it was them...."  
  
"The Muscovites."  
  
She nodded, "I'd heard....Pavel talk about them, heard him and....they argued about what he should do, you know they fought all the time and it seemed so, like such a waste.....such a waste...."   
  
She stared down at some invisible point and her voice began to sound as far away as her gaze. "Why would you, I mean if you really didn't love someone you shouldn't just keep them, you know, you know there could be somebody there just waiting and waiting and waiting and she was, she, I loved her, I did - she was my best friend but she told me she thought she told me they wouldn't be together, 'I can't see myself growing old with him.' That's what she said and she was right wasn't she , she was right, wasn't she, she was...."  
  
Kirk looked to Chapel and McCoy and realized the rest of his questions would have to wait for now.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"Oh, Mr. Scott." Chapel admonished, "Did you have to get him drunk? Alcohol is a depressant!" She'd stopped by to talk to Chekov about Lee before the ship began 'waking up' at 0600. She didn't have to venture far into the Ensign's quarters, the place smelled like a brewery and the assortment of bottles on the desk and the sprawled form on top of the bed in his rumpled uniform told her all she needed to know.  
  
"Now, lass, maybe when you drink it, and maybe even sometimes when I drink it, but we had a good laugh and he had a sound sleep - in his quarters. And he didn't even puke once." The engineer himself looked a little worse for the wear and Chapel could only roll her eyes at him and shake her head as the engineer bent to rouse the navigator.  
  
"Hey..." Scott frowned, freezing just short of actually touching Chekov. "Look at his face, did he stop using his Depy?"  
  
"No, he shaves." Chapel answered and felt a blush rise to her face when Scotty looked at her - she could tell he was remembering why she was so familiar with Chekov's personal habits. "He...uhm...." she cleared her throat, cursing the catch that always formed there when self-conscious. "It's something his step-father taught him, it's a ritual....he likes it...."   
  
Scotty looked mildly disgusted, "What the hell, does he get up at 3 a.m.? He works out for an hour, has a shower, has a LEISURELY breakfast, you've seen how he dawdles over it, and bloody SHAVES before 0700?" He snorted with definite disgust and slapped the navigator soundly on the shoulder, "Hey!"  
  
Chekov cursed a particularly vulgar sounding epithet and slapped at the hand that slapped him. "Oh, for..." Chapel pushed the engineer aside, with much more strength than the fragile appearance of her frame suggested she could muster, leaned down and commanded, "Pavel, wake up!"  
  
He did. Instantly. Immediately. "What?" His cloudy eyes cleared as they   
focused on Christine's face and he sat up and said decisively, "I need a favour."  
  
And then he looked at her more closely, "What's wrong?"  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
Pavel Chekov's meeting with his Captain had lasted only ten minutes. The Engisn knew before he got to the briefing room what Kirk was about to tell him.  
  
"Ensign Lee was in communication with The Muscovites." Kirk said carefully, watching Chekov's reaction.  
  
"Go on."  
  
"She listened to them. And then, she contacted them. Several times. And then she told them we would be on Iqualuit."  
  
He didn't have to be told why. He knew that already. Chekov thought that maybe he should be enraged. But, he wasn't even angry. Just profoundly sad.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~   
Christine Chapel was one of those people that Pavel Chekov wanted to be someday. Somebody who could get things done. Somebody who had connections. Uhura was like that. So was Sulu to a lesser degree and well, Mr. Scott could get anything in the universe anytime shipped anywhere right away no questions asked, Chekov figured.  
  
Christine had come through for him and he had to laugh to himself - a year ago he barely knew the nurse, now she was one of the first people he wanted to run to when he had exciting news - or needed help. Like now.  
  
"You're kidding me." Dr. Mary Calf Robe scowled at Pavel Chekov and he was thankful that he wasn't actually physically in the room with her, the look was withering enough even transmitted across several thousand light years. "You must be kidding me!" The volume of her voice rose with her exasperation.  
  
"No. I am not. Is only way I can do this." He hated the whine in his voice - but knew that sometimes it, combined with a slight enlargement of his big brown eyes and a little pout could sometimes do wonders in persuading others, especially female others, to go along with him. He promised himself that someday he would stop using such manipulations - just not today.   
  
"Oh, for....Chris, you're not going along with this hare-brained scheme are you?" Dr. Calf Robe studied the nurse's face and the line between her eyebrows cut further into her face, "I'd have expected more sense from you!"  
  
"I know, Mare, it seems.... well, considering......it seems...."  
  
"Ridiculous? Ludicrous? Reckless? Foolhardy? Shit stupid?"  
  
"You have to help me!" Pavel Chekov implored.  
  
"I don't have to do anything young man!" Dr. Calf Robe spit back at him, her brown eyes lighting with anger. "Certainly I don't have to do major surgery that is medically unecessary. I can't believe you're asking me to do this, Chris. To mutilate, because that's what it is, taking apart perfectly normal, healthy tissue and rebuilding it for no medical reason, that's what it is....it is mutilation."  
  
"You have done it for Military Intelligence." Chapel said quietly and she could see on Mary's face that she was angered by her betrayal of a confidential area of her work - and further angered by the almost gleeful look she saw come into Chekov's eyes for now he was certain she could do it. If she could make a human pass for a Klingon or a Romulan, she could sure as hell make him over so his cousin wouldn't recognize him.  
  
"An oxymoronic organization I no longer make myself available to." Calf Robe said coldly.  
  
"Please, Dr. Calf Robe, my cousin Natalia is in very big trouble."  
  
"So, you go there. So you find her - then what? What are you going to do? Drag her out of there? Kidnap her?"  
  
"If I have to. I am hoping to convince her to come home." He said quietly and his eyes stung with real tears because he knew somewhere in the back of his mind he might fail, and then what? They'd never see her again more than likely. It was killing his Aunt Vera, he had to try and this woman glaring at him across the vast expanse could help him. Could help him. But, would she?  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
Help me. Help me. Help me. I can't see. I can't see. I can't see. Help me. Help me.  
  
"Pasha, I'm here." Silver so bright she is lighting the dark. She reaches for him, a pale orchid bowing to reach for him, "Give me your hand."  
  
I can't.  
  
"Give me your hand!"  
  
I can't.  
  
"Give me your heart!"  
  
I can't!  
  
"Reach!"  
  
I can't!  
  
"Then. You are dead."  
  
Were his eyes open? Yes, yes, they were. His heart pounded in the dark. He could taste the salt of his sweat on his mouth as the image of her faded from his brain. Dream.   
  
"Lights." The room blossomed around him and burned into his eyes, "Half light." A little darkness fell and he rolled onto his side. This was the third time he'd had this dream. He sat up deciding that, even though it was barely 0300 hours, sleep was a visitor he probably wouldn't be seeing tonight.   
  
He might as well get it over with. He padded over to the desk and activated his messaging. It blinked at him as it had the last two days. A message from his mother. He sighed, feeling the anxiety welling up inside him.   
  
Catherine Ivanova was so emotional! His relationship with her had been fragile these last few years. She was guilty and apologetic. He was guilty and resentful. How did it get to be such a mess?   
  
He started to open the message and then stopped and pulled open his desk drawer. He pulled the flask out and put it to his mouth and then froze. He quickly put it down again.   
  
This wasn't the first time he'd used vodka to dampen his anxiety, though he certainly didn't make a habit of it. He put the flask back in the drawer. He didn't have the gene for alcoholism but neither did some of the universe's problem drinkers. He didn't need anymore problems right now and the vodka seemed to be offering more than he was willing to take from it tonight. He wanted always to be a drinker who drank to have a good time with his friends or unwind or be sociable. He wanted to not drink if he chose. He thought if he wasn't careful he might lose that choice.  
  
"Play." he commanded the terminal and instantly there she was. Catherine Ivanova. Her beauty now a thing gone fragile, a petal with brittleness hardening her edges. Of all his friends growing up he certainly had the most beautiful mother of all.   
  
It was like growing up with a fairy princess - on the ice she skated to Prokofiev's Troika Overture most famously. Off the ice she had married one of the most famous singers and composers of his time. Raven haired and ruby lipped - it was an old song. It was Catherine, too.   
  
Her tiny stature in youth enchanted - now it seemed weak, as though she had been crushed by the weight of her years with Zhukov, by the guilt of her paralytic inability to remove her child from danger.  
  
"Freeze." Chekov commanded again. He studied her face. When had she gotten so old! She wasn't though...no, she wasn't so old, what would she be....only forty-nine, she looked a hundred and forty-nine. Her face was still relatively unlined, the fabulous, celebrated Chekov bone structure holding up but....why did she look so ancient to him now? What had happened to her?  
  
His mind reeled back the time to their last personal visit. It was almost two years ago. Two years? This had happened to her in two years? What was the matter?   
  
She was happy with Andre, he knew that. Her letters, and his, confirmed their marriage was stronger now than it had ever been.  
  
'It's me.' he thought dismally. 'I did this to her.' His gut twisted and his mouth could taste the comfort that could be found in the bottle in the desk.  
  
No! He cleared his mind as Sulu had taught him a few years back when he'd run into trouble being unable to shut off the anxiousness he was feeling just before he was named the permanent alpha shift navigator.  
  
'Breathing in. Breathing out. I'm breathing in. I'm breathing out. I'm breathing in. I'm breathing out.' He opened his eyes again, feeling more settled.  
  
'Play.'  
  
"Pavel Andreivich." Her voice was melodic, but also melancholy - still, it made him smile. For a moment he was a kid again, the kid who had known joy in his life, patches of it, now grown together more solidly than ever before....until recently.....  
  
"Oh, Pasha," and then she surprised him by speaking in Standard. " I can't believe what has happened! I am so sorry. Your babushka prays for Martha - we all pray for her - so beautiful, so young! Oh, Pasha, Pasha....that lovely girl, so sweet and young, is too awful, horrible....."   
  
It was what he feared, her emotional intensity drained him and then...  
  
"Nyet! Nyet! I am sorry. I know you hate this goings on. If you need anything call us. Andre is away, again, is alright. I am fine. All is good here. You are strong. You will have this alright. Tsk. You will be alright, I mean." Her smile bloomed suddenly, the petal revived like a dessert blossom drinking up it's one and only yearly rainfall. "How you speak all the time this language I am not understanding too well."  
  
He laughed out loud at that. She was a snob sometimes, somewhat xenophobic, Russian ballet, please was there any other kind! Russian figure skating - what else was there!   
  
He felt a twinge then, wondering how much she had influenced Natalia - Natalia had spent hours in the rink with her Aunt CattyCattya as she had called her.  
  
Chekov set the thought aside - the past was done. Over. He could only move ahead now.  
  
"I am around here you know. All the time. You can call. When Enterprise is close okay? Okay." She looked down and seemed to be trying to think of something else to say and then she said quietly, "I haven't much to say to the young man who is my son, it seems." Her brown eyes flicked back up to the screen, twinkling behind a thin film of tears threatening to spill down her face at any second. "Dosvedanya....Pasha...."  
  
The screen went black and her tears spilled down his face instead.  
  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
A mere ten days after sending her son the message Catherine Ivanova had heard Enterprise was coming home. Home! He wouldn't have to call. She would see him! Then she heard Enterprise was coming home but Pavel Andreivich was not.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
He didn't think he would ever set foot in this miserable place again and it's dreary gloom hit him with dark foreboding as he materialized in Iqualuit's main square. He felt himself sway slightly and his shoulder bumped Uhura. She gripped his arm and gave him a reassuring look - and then did a double take.  
  
"I can't get used to it."   
  
He sighed. This was the fourth time she'd said that in an hour, he was positive. He had counted. Now, how petty was THAT, he wondered.  
  
Her unease with his new appearance had at least once again served to distract him from something. At this moment it had deflected his considerable distaste for the ugly (was it ugly before? or just....after...) place.   
  
He looked around at the mucky street and smiled to himself as Dr. Calf Robe's voice came back to him, "Are you sure you want to be mucking around with this?" She had turned his face, her finger at his chin, her eyes wandering, calculating, her mind already measuring and judging and deciding.  
  
They were sitting in the very luxuriously, and somewhat garrishly, appointed main cabin of a private yacht. Who could own such a thing, Pavel wondered and then thought, 'Well, I grew up in a palace for Chrissakes!" Still, a private ship like this....Dr. Calf Robe's friend Harry Eickhart owned it and sure she could use the 'Blithe Spirit' as long as she wanted - as long as she was sure of the pilot's credentials.  
  
Chekov didn't think he'd ever forget the gleeful look on Sulu's face when the pilot saw her docked at Starbase 19. He thought the helmsman was going to fall to the ground weeping and kiss the runners artfully sculpted ion enhanced warp drive nacelle.   
  
She was one of the prettiest ships the helmsman had ever seen. Even Scotty was impressed - and a bit sulky not having the chance to poke around the Spirit as Enterprise was leaving that very hour for home.  
  
The three Enterprise officers had watched silently from the Spirit's cockpit as Enterprise turned away and glided past, blinking her starboard running lights in farewell before cracking space open with her warp drive and disappearing into the black.   
  
It had been a quick goodbye, terse and tense and thick with unspoken admonishments, gratitudes and promises of reunion and back to work in no time at all.  
  
"It won't take any time at all." Dr. Calf Robe had told him. "Maybe an hour, hour and a half. Implants: chin, cheekbones. I'll break your nose and insert a nice little sliver of dualon, widen it. I'll reshape your brow ridge. It won't take much, millimeters of dualon and you'll be a new person."  
  
"They may have security scanners."  
  
"I can't do anyting about a retinal scan."   
  
He started to protest at that because he knew she could - but wouldn't.  
  
She held up her hand, "Forget it! It's too dangerous! I'm not going to chance blinding you. But, we're going to have to do something about your eyes. I think a bit of lid retraction - I'll bleach out your irises - give you hazel colouring. But that won't disguise a retinal scan - if they have one, you're sunk."  
  
"Unless I disable it."  
  
"I don't want to know about it."  
  
He shut up then, again. As he had everytime she had said that. She was angry with him. With Chris. But, she had agreed to go along with it. He wasn't sure why. He didn't ask. He would ask Christine. Later. His list of things to do 'later' was growing at an exponentially frightening speed.  
  
"Since she would recognize your voice I'll abrade your vocal chords a bit - it'll be sore for awhile - your voice will be really hoarse for a few days, then it'll settle, but you won't sound like you."  
  
"Good." He didn't smile at her, but he did say, "Thank you."  
  
She nodded at him, then, "Have you any scars or marks on your body that are recognizable?"  
  
He swallowed. "Yes."  
  
"Where?"  
  
"I have birthmark on my shoulder and a couple of scars...." His voice trailed off.  
  
"Why didn't you get them repaired?"   
  
He didn't answer. He didn't want to. Suddenly everything seemed overwhelming. This whole thing. Change his appearance. He had a fake identity already, well, the paper work anyway - and he was listed in the databases as Dmitri Sergeivich Chernyshevsky - an astrophyisicist from Moscow, unemployed, drifting through odd jobs from Earth to Iqualuit. He had two brothers and they were Constantine and ...and....damn! He had to remember all this detail and background, a whole other life. What the hell was he thinking?  
  
Dr. Calf Robe leaned forward and gripped his hand. "Pavel...."  
  
What was she asking him? Oh, yes.... "Some of them are....they are like badges...."  
  
"For what?"  
  
"Surviving."  
  
"Oh." She let of his hand and leaned back. "Do you want to keep them?"  
  
His mind clicked over very quickly, what were the chances Natalia would see him naked? Even if she did, she wouldn't think it was him, she wouldn't remember the scar on his upper arm, she wouldn't get close enough to see the seven centimeter scar that traced along his collarbone (the big Pushkin short story edition, the leather bound one had caused that...the corner of it cutting him as his father hurled it at him). The only ones he had repaired had been the scars on his wrists.  
  
"Pavel?"  
  
He looked at her and nodded slowly - amazed at how he was loathe to lose these vestiges of his painful youth. But, he had earned them...and he carried them now and stood up beneath them and had borne them. He earned the right to keep them.  
  
The effect, when the surgery was done was not what he expected. He was kind of plain. His face had a flat sort of moonish look now - his eyes were a dull hazel colour that seemed to have lost their fire - his nose crooked. His beard was growing in nicely - he looked like a Dmitri Chernyshevsky, like someone lost - nondescript, hollow.  
  
"Come on." Uhura said, clapping her hands in the cold of the square, "Let's get a drink before Dr. Reed gets here."  
  
But, when they entered the dark bar designated as the rendezous, Reed was already waiting for them in the far corner. She stood as the officers crossed the heavy plank floor littered with debris that occasionally crunched under their boots. She was even smaller than Uhura, and shook their hands silently and once all three were seated said, "Thank you for coming, Ensign Chekov."  
  
"Thank you?" he was surprised.  
  
"Anything I can do to combat a cult, anytime I can educate someone about what they are and how they work, it's one more person who can't be recruited." She turned to Uhura and smiled, "I'm Dr. Donna Reed."  
  
"Oh, I'm sorry!" Chekov interjected quickly. "Lt. Uhura, Communications Officer - and good friend."  
  
"Pleased to meet you." Dr. Reed said as she signalled the waitress. "I ordered for us, their specialty, the only thing they serve. Something called Screech from Newfoundland."  
  
The Enterprise officers got a shock when they got their first good look at their server - from across the place all they could see was a creature floating about the room delivering drinks and dressed in some saloon girl get-up that reminded Chekov uncomfortably of Sylvia on Melkot.   
  
The old woman came round and Pavel Chekov had an irrational urge to jump up and help her with the tray of drinks she was carrying - until he notice the biceps on the old woman. She had to be at least a hundred and twenty, but she looked solid enough - and surly enough - to take him down easily.   
  
She grinned at him as she set her drink down and then laughed heartily and thumped him on the shoulder, "Don't get up there sweetie. It's alright! I love my job!"  
  
She swanned off and Dr. Reed grinned, "She really does you know. She owns three of the stores on the square, she owns this place, has never put dime one into it since building, she's loaded but she does this all day. Always wanted to be a saloon girl, whatever the hell that is, don't think I want to know."  
  
The doctor hefted her glass and Uhura and Chekov followed suit as Dr. Reed intoned, "To reunions."  
  
They each took a sip of what seemed to be a clear liquid form of molten lead. Dr. Reed choked a little and laughed a bit watching the Enterprise officers splutter, "Aptly named."  
  
There was a brief silence while they recovered control of their central nervous systems and Reed spoke up after only clearing her throat three times.. "Okay. You want to know about The Muscovites. I can tell you about them. I can also tell you that you should stay the hell away."  
  
Reed turned her bright eyes on Pavel Chekov and sighed, "But, I can see it would do no good." She turned to Uhura, "Can't you talk any sense into him?"  
  
"I think he's doing the right thing." The officer said levelly as she stopped playing with the glass she had decided not to pick up again in this lifetime.  
  
"You do?"   
  
"Yes."  
  
Dr. Reed clasped her hands on the table in front of her and leaned toward Uhura. "Why?"  
  
"Because Natalia is in a cult and....."  
  
Reed leaned in closer, "And, what's wrong with that?"  
  
Even the normally unflappable comm officer felt a surge of adrenaline at the doctor's challenging posture. "Pardon?"  
  
"What's wrong with it? Why do you want to get her out?"  
  
"Well, because it's a...."  
  
"What do they teach?'  
  
"Teach?"  
  
"A twisted form of Russian Orthodoxy." Chekov supplied.  
  
"So?" Reed answered, her voice taking on volume as well as a patronizing tone..  
  
"So?" Chekov replied, "What do you...."  
  
She turned on the Ensign and demanded, "What do you care what your cousin believes?"  
  
"I don't...."  
  
Speaking rapidly now, the psychologist fired her questions at her two bewildered companions. "Would you still love her if she became a Catholic?"  
  
"Of course?"  
  
"Or a Hindu?"  
  
"What does this...."  
  
"Or a Buddhist?"  
  
"This is ridiculous!" Chekov finally exclaimed.  
  
Dr. Reed leaned back in her chair and smiled at them and said quietly and calmly. "So, it's not what they teach then that's the problem, is that right?"  
  
"I don't know...I guess not."  
  
"No - you're right. To a certain extent it doesn't matter. A cult is not characterized as a cult because of WHAT they teach, but HOW."  
  
"Like the mind control techniques we learned about at the Academy?"  
  
"Somewhat. The Muscovites are much more subtle than anyone in a Klingon prison camp would be and maybe that's one of the things that makes them so dangerous."  
  
"I don't understand."  
  
The woman took a deep breath and continued, "I'm trying to get you to understand that, it's their methods, not their message that make them a cult. Even though part of their message is that Father Grigory is a Czar - it would be okay to be offered that as a catechism if it weren't wrapped in the harmful cloak of mind control."  
  
"I'm confused." Uhura admitted.  
  
"Me too." Chekov agreed.  
  
"There are particular techniques that cults use. Some of them you already know."  
  
"Sleep deprivation." Chekov said.  
  
"Yes, they use that a lot and almost always first. Their first introductory seminars and evenings are always very long and you are not allowed to leave them. They usually use the excuse of disturbing others in the audience, disrupting the energy, whatever they want to call it. You go for the evening, don't plan on leaving until the end." The doctor dared to take another sip of Screech and instead of coughing afterwards smiled through the warm honey that seemed to spread through her body all at once.  
  
"So, what's the problem with that?" Uhura asked, toying with her glass again.  
  
"Have you ever seen a theatrical production in an almost empy theatre?"  
  
They both nodded.  
  
"Didn't there feel like something was missing?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"You can see the same play, in the same theatre, once with a full audience, once with an empty audience and find them two totally different experiences because of something very human called empathetic response. If the play is sad and you are alone you may feel a lump in your throat. If the play is sad and you are surrounded by weeping and wailing people, most likely you'll be overwhelmed yourself and the play that barely caused a little tremor before will have you wrung out like an old dishrag by the end."  
  
"But...how does that apply to The Muscovites?" Chekov asked.  
  
"Have you been to one of their orientation meeting?"  
  
"No."  
  
"It's like an old time revival. Very charismatic man is Father Grigory - he can play an audiences emotions very well....and the audience is planted with people who will stand up and share their heart rending life stories with this audience. This audience that has been locked in this auditorium for four, five, maybe six hours with no respite. They're getting tired, tired, tired and he starts to talk very quietly, softly, telling them that in order to save themselves, in order to find what they have been seeking, in order to pull themselves out the malaise they're feeling right now, the void in their life that their feeling right now and believe me, they're feeling it now. In order to save themselves from that and find that big bright future and that peace of mind and that safe place and that calm they will have to open themselves to his gift. They will have to share themselves with him and you know that nobody will get up right then. This is a roomful of strangers being asked to talk about intimate fears and they won't - but there is someone in the audience who will. Someone who looks just like everyone else but she's one of Father Grigory's best, little Lana, oh, by God you should see her! She's all of 5 feet tall, little tiny blonde thing and little tiny voice and she will command that whole room with a story of abuse and sexual assault committed by her evil step-father and she will hold herself around her abdomen like her tears will shake her apart and soon she will have that whole room weeping with her as she tells them she has nowhere and no one who loves her and not a word of it is true. But they'll cry, all of them, they'll cry and cry for this little pathetic creature and Father Grigory will shed more tears than anyone and he will step down off his high place and move into the crowd and take her by the hand and lead her up to the stage, up there high with him, uplifting her, and a couple of the choir singers will step forward and hug this wretched little creature and the audience will cheer as she melts into their robes and you know, she looks like a little lost child being wrapped in angels wings and do you know he's probably got half the audience right there. Because he's used such a simple thing as the human empathic response - but, they don't recognize it - it doesn't occur to them that they cried just as hard at that play last week because Father Grigory is telling them now that they can have it too because he can give it to them - and they will transfer that most natural, biological, emotional response onto him. And then he'll let them go for a break and they'll go out and mingle around the auditorium and the hallways all wiping their eyes and smiling at these strangers who have shared this and some of his people who are planted among them will encourage them to talk about what a powerful experience they just had. Wasn't it amazing? And they, Grigory's people will rant and rave, "I never had an experience like that!" Well, of course they have. They just don't recognize it because it's wrapped in a psuedo priests robes. That's the first step."  
  
~~~~~~  
  
  
First step...step again...step again...   
  
Somewhere in his feverish blindness Pavel Chekov knew he didn't have the strength to walk one more step. The burning pain in his hands wrung tears unchecked from his eyes, he didn't care, it didn't even occur to him to care, he was so exhausted he knew he was going to collapse at any moment.   
  
The only thing keeping him moving was the bitter cold that was freezing his tears to his face - and the pain; the ironic white searing pain of freezing extremities, the nerves screaming in his hands kept him moving, he kept hoping that with the next step he would somehow walk right out of this hell, that if he could somehow keep ahead of the bloody trail he was leaving he would be okay.   
  
And he knew, in that small place that still cared about survival, after 25 days with these people, that stopping out here would be suicide....the thought crossed his mind and stayed...it would be so easy to lay down here, in the white, in the snow and just let it take him...it would be so easy...it would be...  
  
  
"Brother Chernyshevsky!" Somebody had hold of him and then he was out of the blinding snow and he was in the dark and there was warmth and softness and he curled up and tried to remember....something.....something important....oh, yes....  
  
'It is day 25. I am Pavel Chekov. I am an Ensign in Starfleet. Father Grigory is a liar. Father Grigory is a liar. Father Grigory is a liar."  
  
He had to hang onto that. "I am Ensign Pavel Chekov. I am an Ensign in Starfleet...I am an Ensign in Starfleet... and my friends are only 30 kilometres from here...my friends are waiting for me...my friends are waiting for me, Pavel Chekov, an Ensign in Starfleet" He thought it everyday. A hundred times a day.   
  
"Aaagghhhh!" he screamed as the nerve endings in his hands had enough blood in them to register the full impact of both the shock of freezing and the severe lacerations and stab wounds the splitting ax handle had driven into his hands after seven brutal hours of chopping frozen wood.  
  
"Ssshhhh! Ssshhhhh! Child....hush child....there there......"   
  
The voice calmed him, made him feel safe. "Father?"  
  
He kept his eyes closed so only felt the man's presence, and the strong hands that moved to cup his face. "I am here, my son....give me your hands."  
  
'Be careful! It is the liar' he thought. 'He is asking me something. Be careful.'  
  
"Give me your hands, child." Sadness was there, and pity, and such gentleness. Soothing this voice was and deep, of course, it could be nothing else, expressing as it did, depths of mystery, of secret knowledge.....sacred knowledge that would take away this crippling terror.....nyet!!   
  
Pavel Chekov wept, in physical pain and exhaustion and anguish over the foolhardiness of his stupid plan.  
  
What was he going to do! He hadn't even seen Natalia once! He hadn't been allowed on half the compound. He'd only been in far enough to chop wood and carry it to the central supply station and he'd only been allowed to stay in his room in the back of the kitchen and listen as the others prepared the communal meals. And, he ate his bowl of kasha alone, listening to the merriment in the main dining hall. So much laughter.  
  
They had not welcomed him like family. Suspicious from the start, testing him every minute of every day. Working him. Questioning him. What did he want? Why was he here? What did he know about them? Why was he worthy of becoming one of them? He was useless - did he know that? Useless to them in his occupation - what possible trade could an astrophysicist turn their hand to here? Very well, then. Those hands would learn other skills, skills that would make him useful to them, then perhaps he would be worthy of being considered for membership. Maybe he could even eat with them.  
  
He found himself ostracized from the start and in his rational mind he knew he should hate them - but it was twenty days and more now since anyone had a kind word for him. Twenty days of bone numbing fatigue. Of mind wearing exhaustion. Of hunger. Of thirst. Of cold, fitful sleeps on a hard floor. Of harsh words and cold hearts.   
  
Twenty days he had worked chopping wood and his hands had toughened enough to take the pounding and then today the ax handle had split in the cold and driven shards and spikes of frozen wood sharp and hard as ditanium through both his hands and he was alone.  
  
He was alone - away from the compound, in the woods and nobody knew he was hurt and he was bleeding badly, he knew from his Starfleet first aid training that it was serious, that it could even be fatal, he was losing that much blood, and as he lost it he lost body temperature and he was losing time.  
  
He started back, walking quickly, and soon found himself out of breath, shivering, blinded by tears and the searing light of the white white snow and the sun that cut shards of glass from the landscape to hurl at his eyes and he was terrified that he was going to die out here, like this, and Natalia would never know. Never know that Pasha was just metres away and he was going blind and he was bleeding to death and he was dying and she wouldn't know.  
  
His mind jolted him along on a dizzying replay of the afternoon's events, caught as it was in the vortex of the pain that had not eased - his body convulsed on the sobs being slammed out of him and he fought down hysteria, he fought down terror, he fought down regret.....but he couldn't hold them at bay forever and the agony that were his hands were tearing chunks of his now fragile sanity away.  
  
"Give me your hands, son."  
  
Yes, of course. Here was the answer. He turned toward the only light in the little room and offered the bloody remnants and they were taken and lifted to the face of The Liar Grigory, as Pavel Chekov thought of him.  
  
And The Liar Grigory blew on his hands and the pain slipped away on his pine scented breath and slid from Pavel's hands like silk scarves and there was coolness and Pavel's mind stopped it's spin and he cried now in relief and surprise at the suddenness of the agony's passing and he began to sink.  
  
He sank away from the face of the Liar kissing his bleeding hands, he sank away from the room, just now slowing it's spin.  
  
He sank away from the face of the Father - and felt empty and sad for the leaving as though he were leaving home and a small shock went through him and he wept once more for the loss of another piece of himself.  
  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Through the comfort of blackness Pavel Chekov struggled to find his way to now, because now he was not out there anymore, he was not cold anymore, now he was warm. But his mind lingered in the snow field and the bloody walk home, alone.  
  
But, he was not alone anymore. Now someone was speaking kind words to him.   
  
A young woman spoke with a voice like a morning sparrow, a voice that soothed his jumping heart, a voice he found comfort in, a voice he had found comfort in before and.....he opened his eyes.  
  
She blinked back at him and smiled and he saw what he always saw when she smiled like that.   
  
'There it is.' he thought, the wonderful crinkling lines that etched her face with warmth and empathy and compassion and he almost said her name but someone else said it first.  
  
"Irina Federovna be sure you cover the wounds well, they won't hurt anymore and it will keep infection at bay." He had seen the speaker before. Lily they called her, weathered and worn, she looked as though she had spent her entire life in the kitchen she now ran.  
  
But, Irina Federovna Galiulin looked as she always had looked to him.....like sunshine.  
  
He closed his eyes again, "Bozhe moi!" he breathed.  
  
And Irina took his face in her cool white hands like she always had and his heart twisted violently in his chest and he hoped it might be a heart attack coming to end this madness.  
  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 


	2. Murderers

**I do apologize for the incredible delay in continuing with this story - I shall post it chapter by chapter as I write them and I thank you all so much who have read and reviewed and emailed! Enjoy...Dia  
  
Captain Kirk leaned back from his desk and frowned at Sulu's message. Damn it, what was Chekov pulling! He'd been out of touch through his check-in time (every two weeks) - late now by four days and of course Sulu and Uhura were wondering what the hell to do.  
  
It was what they had feared. Sulu and Uhura were standing by - but to do what?   
  
Walk in and pretend to join? Good luck! A Japanese man from San Francisco and a Swahili woman from the Bantu Nation were going to have fun trying to join a Russian cult.  
  
Go in with phasers blazing and try to break Chekov and his cousin out? They could do that of course, but they could then kiss their Starfleet careers dosve-damn-danya.  
  
Kirk was beginning to regret having okayed such a plan. Hell, you couldn't even call the thing a plan, just a cockamamie escapade some of his officers had planned for their extended leaves while Enterprise underwent whatever Scotty decided she would undergo.  
  
If there was one thing Kirk hated it was sitting and waiting while someone else was in the middle of some action. And, all he'd been doing was sitting and waiting for a considerable time. He was not happy. Neither were the crewmembers doing their best to avoid pissing off their increasingly irritable Captain.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"He's going to be really pissed." Sulu said. Again.   
  
Uhura sighed, watching him pace the confines of their very luxurious prison, the Blithe Spirit. Uhura was not a person usually bored. She had too many interests to be bored, and as her mother always told her, "A bored person is a boring person."  
  
Hikaru Sulu was bored.   
  
And Nyota Uhura could not believe it. Sulu, who was king of the hobby-of-the-week club was driving her mad because he couldn't think of anything to occupy his time while they waited for a communication from Chekov.  
  
Time ticked away on the little ship while Uhura distracted herself with planning a mosaic pattern for an occasional table in her quarters. She always painted some of the tiles with a design and then smashed them with a hammer.  
  
Smashing something with a hammer would feel really swell right now.  
  
She allowed herself to focus once more (possibly the four thousandth time) on the problem at hand. What do we do about the silent navigator?  
  
A thought popped into her head at that moment, "What would happen if we were to make inquiries about doing some trading with the Muscovites?"  
  
"Trading for what?"  
  
"I don't know, I just thought of it!" She hadn't intended to reply so sharply but honestly her nerves were on edge as well - and she couldn't always summon the renowned Lt. Uhura cool when she needed it. "Sorry."  
  
He smiled an acceptance at her and mulled over her idea in silence for a moment.  
  
He decided to use that moment to put tea on to brew - he loved the fact that the Blithe Spirit not only had replicators, it had gadgets for making 'real' food, it wasn't logical, Spock would have said, not to regard replicated food as 'real' since its molecular structure was identical to the 'real' article.  
  
Still, there were many humans, and Sulu and Uhura were two of them, who swore they could taste the difference. Blithe Spirit was stocked with an astonishing number of exotic teas, several of which Dr. Reed had warned were hallucinogenic.  
  
"Oh, my God!" Uhura jumped up. "The tea!"  
  
"The tea!" Sulu shouted back. "What will we do with it!"  
  
Uhura sat back down. "I don't know. Something."  
  
"Drug some people?"  
  
"Well...we could maybe set up a trade with them. Go in with some of our more exotic Non-hallucinogenic varieties...and keep with us, on us, I mean, when we meet with them, some of the others - we might need them if we can't get Pavel out easily, I mean, hell I have no idea how we're going to get that boy out of there, even if he can walk under his own..."  
  
Sulu saw it almost before it showed on her face. Uhura had a habit of mothering Pavel to an extent that drove the young man nearly mad - she had curtailed her behaviour in the past year as she acknowledged his maturing - but she could not stop the emotional investment she had in the welfare of the 'bridge baby'.  
  
She did not ariticulate her fear here - she knew Sulu had the same fear - it was just that she was stopped by the phrase she had nearly said, 'walk out under his own power' and the fear he had been hurt put a stop at her sudden amusement at the fact that they, Sulu and Uhura, would have to-  
  
"We have to test the tea." She decided to put aside her fear for now - she could do nothing about it at this very instance anyway - and turn to an action plan.  
  
Sulu blinked at her sudden reversion to the subject of the tea and then grinned, "I've already put the kettle on!"  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"I've put the kettle on." She smiled at him - Irina always smiled - his thoughts darkened as he thought of his cousin and the smile now pasted eternally to her face, a smile of vagueness, of blind obedience, of a destination of mind, isolated and exclusive, reached and never to be forsaken.  
  
He studied Galiulin's smile and couldn't tell the difference between this smile and her old smile. How the hell did she keep getting herself tangled up with these fake gurus? What was she looking for?   
  
Acceptance. The word came to him in Standard in his mind. He had been concentrating on thinking in Standard, hoping to keep a barrier, a buffer, between himself and his cultic environment. If only she could have found it in herself.   
  
His gut tightened, remembering his own judgment of her.  
  
"You are very quiet, Brother." She smiled, again, as her small fingers quickly crocheted some lilac coloured thing in front of a lace covered window.   
  
He smiled back at her, noting the way the afternoon sun was highlighting around her hair - like a halo. He almost laughed out loud.  
  
She was no angel! Far from it!  
  
It was one of the things that had drawn Pavel Chekov to her initially. Irina was wild - an unpredictable rebel - she was exciting and funny and warm and sexy and there was this terrible sadness in her sometimes that just killed him.  
  
Irina, the old Irina, the one he knew so well not so many years ago, had cried as easily as she laughed. She was an emotional rollercoaster and she had taken him on a ride that he endured for almost two years, the longest intimate relationship of his life.  
  
At one point he had actually thought he might marry her. Other days he thought he couldn't take another day. The latter won out, and one day, to his everlasting shame, he just left. Just went away.   
  
He didn't tell her where he was going. Didn't even tell her he WAS going. She went to the Academy classes one day and he had requested a leave and gone to the dacha of a family friend - a friend Irina did not know.  
  
He consoled himself with the fact that he had not only left word with a mutual friend that he was going to be gone for awhile, that he was alright but that he had left her a note, apologizing profusely but saying he just couldn't take the tremendous highs and horrendous lows of their very tumultuous relationship.  
  
No one had ever been as close to him as Irina. No woman had ever been as cruel - as loving - as manipulative - as fun - as jealous - as kind. He had laughed harder with her, cried harder, had more fun, more pain, more tenderness and more cruelty than with anyone in his life. He thought it might kill him.   
  
He was drawn to her, and she to him, in a way neither of them had experienced before or since. They had often talked about it - it was so strange, so strong, it was like water or breathing - only the air would turn foul and the water stagnant and had been sustaining was suddenly poisoning.  
  
They had gone to counselling because they both understood that love was not supposed to be this way. The psychologist had told them that each of them forced the other to work out their issues in order to satisfy their partners.  
  
Intellectually they understood what that meant - it meant Irina, being so compassionate and kind and warm, was an easy person for Pavel to trust to a certain level of intimacy. It also meant that her own insecurities would rise as they got closer to each other, would cause her to say cruel things to him, to keep him away - to which he would reply with equal cruelty to punish her for allowing him to let his guard down.  
  
Understanding something intellectually was a whole different thing than being able to overcome the firey emotions fueling the inferno in which they felt engulfed.  
  
The psychologist also advised them that their youth, their inexperience with serious relationships, their emotionally traumatic backgrounds, probably meant their relationship was doomed and they would do well not to over-romanticize the connection they had made. It was not the epic, once in a century love story they might have felt it to be.  
  
It was two scared kids emotionally tormenting each other as they tried to get closer.   
  
Lost in his thoughts, he made a soft noise.  
  
"Are you in pain?" Irina was watching him, her fingers still for the moment.  
  
He shook his head. She had left off asking him why he was so quiet quite some time ago and she stood now, "The kettle didn't whistle," She laughed, "Maybe someone forgot to put water in?"   
  
He grinned at her and she left the room.  
  
For days she had been beside him. Silent most of the time. She was like that. She didn't mind silence - it was one of the things he always liked about her.  
  
So many women he'd been with wanted to talk, talk, talk all the time. Where did you grow up? What did your parents do? What kind of childhood did you have?  
  
Irina had always let him talk - never demanded it of him. She had grown closer to him in other ways than talking. Sex, yes, and she taught him a few things in bed, more than a few.   
  
He almost laughed out loud at that. She had been considerably more experienced.  
  
He turned his mind from memories of their time together and tried to figure out how he was going to contact Uhura and Sulu....someone had been with him twenty-four hours a day since he had been hurt eight days before...but surely they could see he was alright now, he could be alone now.  
  
Father Grigory had been to see him several times. Pavel resisted the man's charisma as best he could - but there was no denying the man had a powerful, hypnotic presence, an overwhelming warmth and compassion seemed to eminate from him and he had actually taken the pain out of his hands with his very breath it seemed.  
  
The scientific training in his mind had been at work overtime trying to figure that one out. There had been a strong scent, like pine, when Grigory had blown on his frozen and lacerated hands, it had to be a plant of some kind, indigenous to the planet.  
  
He would have to ask Sulu, amateur botanist, about it. Damn it, he needed to contact them before they did something stupid!  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"That's the stupidest thing I've ever seen! Do it again!" Uhura was laughing so hard tears flowed down her cheeks and she struggled to hold her ribs together, sure they would crack under the strain.  
  
Sulu grinned and hitched his impersonation of their intrepid Captain Kirk up a notch - matching Kirk's swagger, and especially his herky, jerky speech, "Lt. Uhura....get the....Romulans... on the horn and...tell them to...go screw....themselves...I'm not giving back....my....Orion slave girl!"  
  
Uhura screamed and slid off the sofa, "OKAY! STOP! STOP!"  
  
Sulu stretched and yawned and picked up his notepad. "Okay, then, Rigellian Cool Mountain seems to do the trick."  
  
Through her hysterical laughter a red alert was bleeping for attention from Uhura, she sat up, "Hey! H'com you so...so...yooouu knooww....whwhwhhw....nor...MAL...hmmmm....hmmmm....hmmmhahahhahaha."  
  
"Because I only had half a cup and you had three. Wait...does that mean....I'm not thinkin' so normal either...just a second here...does that mean that it's...uhm...not...not...shit what word...not....potent! Not potent enough. We need something to knock somebody on ...their ass with just a...not much you know....Isn't that sensical? Uhura? Nyota? ....Wow....she can really snore...."  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 


	3. Weddings and Babies

CHAPTER 3 - Thanks for reading everyone! This is a shorter chapter still - but I promise to keep them coming on a weekly basis till it's done! cheers...Dia  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"WAKE UP!"   
  
Sulu shot to his feet before his brain shook it's way to consciousness.   
  
He looked around....what....?  
  
Holy shit! Fully awake now, he scrambled across to Uhura and the comm board and long overdue voice issuing from it now.  
  
"I'm okay. I'm sorry I missed call. I can't talk long."  
  
"Goddamn it where were you!" The helmsman shouted past Uhura's response, earning a glare from her that shut him up immediately.  
  
"I'm sorry. I was slightly injured."  
  
"Eight days late and you say slighty?"  
  
"An axe handle split and went through my hands."  
  
"Oh, my God. How is it? Did they-"  
  
"Uhura, I haven't got time. I just wanted to check in. I'm fine. I haven't seen Natalia ...but I've seen someone else...Irina Galliulin is here...." He made a noise that didn't quite get through the mic. "Father Grigory has decided that we should marry okay I have to go now...out."  
  
"Whoa!" Sulu shouted, to empty air. He was gone.  
  
The helmsman and the communications officer looked at each other - mirroring each other's slack jawed amazement.  
  
Uhura recovered first, "Put that damned kettle on."  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
He always thought that he would marry someday. He was one of the few Starfleet officers he knew who did think that.  
  
But, he didn't think it would be to Irina (though he did think it at one time) and he sure as hell didn't think it would be on some planet he'd never heard of, in front of his beloved cousin Natalia, who was married herself now to a heretical Russian priest, she an ersatz Czarina now , the leader of the maniacs who'd killed his girlfriend.  
  
And he didn't think it would be with this face he studied in the mirror.  
  
His wedding suit was traditional somewhere, but certainly not in Russia. A high collared silk shirt, a linen suit jacket to his knees, linen trousers, low boots. Some other day he would have thought it looked pretty good.  
  
Today all he could think of was that he was finally going to see Natalia, his cousin.   
  
He only hoped he didn't blurt out something stupid, like 'Cousin, I've got to get you out of here!'  
  
He felt a twist of guilt in his gut. Pain for Irina. Hadn't given her a second thought since Father Grigory informed them that he would marry them.  
  
He knew Natalia would be at the ceremony and that once he was 'married' into the flock he would be allowed to move about the compound freely. It would be easy then.  
  
"You look very nice, Brother Chernyeshevsky."   
  
Pavel Chekov automatically turned at the name and felt a small bit of panic send his heart racing, 'How easy it has become to answer to that name, as if it were my own.' he thought.  
  
He smiled at Lily, the elderly kitchen supervisor who shuffled toward him, tiny and impossibly wrinkled and impossibly sweet and kind. He leaned down to accept her hug, she slapped him on the back, her noodle like arms displaying her astonishing strength gained over years of hard kitchen work.  
  
Lily hadn't had an easy life he knew - but she was one of the warmest people he'd ever met - a woman whose eyes welcomed you with total acceptance and love.  
  
She was his favorite person in the place and he hoped that he could find some way to help her out of this situation....at least that's what he thought most of the time, sometimes she just seemed so happy he felt like the biggest Scrooge in the world deciding for her that her life was not being lived in a healthy way.  
  
'Maybe I should just forget this, what right do I have to- NO! Damn it!' These confusing thoughts were really starting to get to him...  
  
'Ha!' he thought, 'Wait till tonight. My wedding night....Bozhe moi!'  
  
A stinging slap to his face brought him back to Lily's grinning face, "Where were you? Pay attention boy! You are getting wed - you are getting wed right now! Let's go!"  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
"Let's go!"  
  
"When?" Sulu demanded.  
  
"Today!"  
  
"What!"  
  
"What exactly are we waiting for?!" She began readying the little ship for landing. "It is past time to get some terra firma underfoot - well not TERRA but - solid ground underfoot and a good look at that damned navigator of ours!"  
  
"He's going to get married to Irina? That's so...weird...her not knowing who he is and...I think he could really mess up his head if he sticks around that bloody place too much longer."  
  
"He probably doesn't consider it a real marriage."  
  
"Will there be a real wedding night?"  
  
Uhura made a face he couldn't quite decipher but her words were plain enough, "She might recognize him."  
  
Sulu gave her a look she had no trouble deciphering, she snorted out a bleak laugh, "No, not that. The scar he left unrepaired, she's seen them before."  
  
"Oh, ya. And he hasn't even seen Natalia yet."  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Czarina Natalia liked the weddings the best! She stiffened her shoulders in preparation for the heavy brocade cape the dressers held in their hands.  
  
A simple dip of her head told them to go ahead and settle the weight of responsibility on her tiny shoulders. She shifted slightly, and felt the full, always surprising, weight of the thing.  
  
She heard the hymnal start in the church and smiled. It was time.  
  
She liked the weddings best.  
  
She took her place to the right of the altar and happily waited for the groom to approach and take his place.  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Pavel Chekov tried to slow down his heart by running through the Zen breathing meditation Sulu had taught him once. It worked fairly well, and even under this stress he could feel his heart slow and his muscles relax and just as he was thinking there was nothing to it the doors swung open and there was a church full of people and there was the Czarina, Natalia, his cousin.  
  
"BOZHE MOI" he blurted out and the faces in the church all turned towward him as Lily beside him laughed softly.  
  
"There, there, boy, nothing to it...go on and take your place."  
  
Her little shove was unnecessary, really, because it was not the wedding itself that had brought his outburst, it wasn't even the fact he was 'marrying' a girl he had once loved, who had no idea who he was...no it was none of these things that brought the shout from him.  
  
It was the sight of the very pregnant Czarina. 


	4. The Wedding Crashed

Chapter 4   
  
"Look at that! Is that a cow?" Sulu asked in amazement, pointing across the rolling meadow to the bovine munching contentedly in the afternoon sun.  
  
"That's a cow." Uhura confirmed.  
  
"Wow. That's a big cow."  
  
Uhura grinned as the helmsman crowded a little closer to her and tried to steer them in a wider berth around the...steer.  
  
'Maybe that's WHY they're called steers' she thought, but didn't say.  
  
Instead she chided him gently, "It doesn't even have horns."  
  
"Ah...shit!" Sulu stopped and looked at his boot.  
  
Uhura grinned to herself as she sat in the pew of the church waiting. She seemed to remember Pavel telling her that the Russian Orthodox churches didn't have pews, that the congregation stood. If that were true she was glad of at least that one difference between the church and Grigory and his flock.  
  
She was keenly aware of the strained silence in the place, nothing to do with what was about to happen, more to do with the strange face in their midst. A dark face.  
  
She tried to turn aside the force of the scrutiny being turned on her and her mind wandered back to the meadow where she and Sulu had been just a half hour ago.  
  
The colour had drained from the fastidious officer's face as he examined his beautiful Rigellian boot and the very common dung hanging from it.  
  
"I seem to remember something about a pilot deciding, against the objections of his passenger, to land four kilometres from the compound...something about a walk in the country?" The communications officer didn't even try to keep the mirth out of her voice.   
  
She gave a full throated laugh and continued walking, mindful of not ending up in the same smelly condition as her companion.  
  
"Who knows..." the helmsman remarked as he skidded the boot on some nice clean grass, "...it may be HOLY SHIT!"   
  
Uhura turned.  
  
A phalanx of very serious looking men appeared on the rise.  
  
Sulu hurried to her side.  
  
She had to roll her eyes, an army he would protect her from,but a cow? Not so much.  
  
She caught him glaring at her, "What's so funny?" he demanded.  
  
"Nothing." She turned away from him and put on her most charming smile as the group of ten men approached.  
  
They didn't look like the type to be charmed. They all wore beards above which they all bore the same wrinkles, grooved into their faces from years of wearing the expressions of suspicion they turned on the two Starfleet officers now.  
  
They stopped. One of them, a great hulking barrel of a man, stepped forward and the voice that issued forth was so startling in it's high pitch and feminine melody that Sulu almost laughed...almost.  
  
What stopped him was the pinch he felt on his left arm where Uhura was digging her fingernail into him,'don't you DARE!'.  
  
Somewhere in the back of his mind another startling fact dawned on him. This guy was speaking Standard.  
  
"...we don't have anything of value to trade."  
  
"We don't have much of value either. We have some unusual fabrics, a few bits and bobs, lovely teas, some used replicat-"  
  
"Teas?"  
  
"Oh, yes, beautiful teas, the man we purchased our craft from left a galley full that my friend and I couldn't possibly consume ourselves."  
  
Uhura smiled inside...she knew damned well what tea meant to Russians. They LOVED it! Pavel himself almost never drank coffee, only tea, black, black tea that would have been unbearable if he didn't pour so much sugar into it she was surprised he didn't have to eat it with a spoon...how that kid had trouble keeping weight on she'd never understand.  
  
There was a brief conference among them and the spokesman turned to them again.  
  
He looked at Sulu, "You will wait here." To Uhura he tipped his head, "Madame, we would be honoured if you would attend our celebration."  
  
"We're not splitting-" Sulu blurted.  
  
"It will be my pleasure to attend." They didn't know she couldn't speak Russian too well...but she could sure understand most of it.   
  
She pinched Sulu again - he gave her hand a squeeze - wishing she'd pick a different spot to pinch because that last one almost had him yelping out loud.  
  
Uhura understood some of what had occurred in the huddle - there was nothing sinister in it - just some junior guys hoping to score points with the higher ups with the score of some nice tea for their Czarina.  
  
She also understood what the celebration was, a wedding. She wanted Sulu to know where she was headed and so was happy when tolling bells gave her a cue to ask, "A celebration sounds lovely, we've had a long trip. What is being celebrated today?"  
  
"The wedding of Brother Chernyeshevsky and Sister Galliulin."  
  
"A wedding! How lovely! Gentlemen!" She held out her arm to their leader, he took it gingerly, "I love weddings!"  
  
She did love weddings, she cried, almost everytime. Perhaps it was the price she paid for being the cool level-headed one in almost any crowd.  
  
This was a solemn crowd. In a solemn place. This church was very plain, rough wood pews, plank floors, wood walls.  
  
The only ornamentation were the gold and red velvet thrones dominating the room from the top of the altar. Even the altar was bare of any religious artifacts.  
  
Just a brown room and those two garish thrones.  
  
She heard the doors behind her swung open, she was dying to turn around and look but since nobody else did she sat as they did, staring stonily to the front.  
  
She was aware of someone moving up the aisle toward her and as he approached and passed her she glanced in his direction. 'He's so thin!' she thought. Boy, McCoy was going to be pissed about that.  
  
As he took his place at the front, she thought he looked small and alone and wished there someone there with him.  
  
Then she mentally slapped herself. It wasn't even him!  
  
Damn those beards!  
  
The man raised his hands. The congregation stood. Uhura stood.  
  
The doors behind the altar swung open and the 'Czar' and 'Czarina' stood resplendent.  
  
They could have been Nicholas and Alexandra. They wore brocades and silks and fur, gold and emeralds and diamonds and rubies.   
  
They were completely out of context for their surroundings.  
  
As they stepped grandly forward Uhura studied the 'Czarina'.  
  
She had never met Pavel's cousin, she was a tiny thing with a sweet face and...oh, brother..she was out to here!  
  
Uhura almost groaned aloud.   
  
Somebody did shout a wordless cry from the rear of the church and the congregation turned.  
  
Uhura did the same, there he was, he wasn't so thin as the other guy but he was a lot paler at the moment. Uhura surmised that he'd just gotten his first look at his cousin.  
  
And someone else, his eyes touched hers briefly, she allowed herself not even a tiny smile, just a look of curiosity.   
  
He did the same, much to his credit, considering his nerves must be pulled taught as piano wire right now.  
  
He was shoved playfully by an old woman standing beside him and he made his way down the aisle. As he passed Uhura she was certain she could hear his heart pounding.  
  
Uhura turned front and centre again and watched as he knelt and kissed the feet of Father Grigory. 'Oh, boy, he'll LOVE that!' she thought and watched as he rose and stepped a step to the right, right in front of his cousin who did not know him.  
  
He knelt again, she offered her hand, he held it in his two hands and kissed it, held it...held it...'Let go Pav. Let go Pav!' Uhura thought as the crowd gave each other quizzical glances.  
  
At last he did let go and Uhura let out the breath she'd been holding as he rose and stood to one side of the altar.  
  
'Here comes the bride' Uhura thought and sure enough she did appear, but not from the back of the church.  
  
She appeared from a door left of the altar.  
  
'Poor girl,' Uhura thought, 'She really looks beautiful, look at her. Poor girl.'  
  
Irina took a step forward then stopped. She was looking right at Uhura. She turned toward Uhura, Uhura had only time to think, 'Oh oh.'  
  
Irina pointed. "She's from Enterprise!" she said in Russian. And then in Standard. "You are from Enterprise!"  
  
Shit. Uhura had only seen Irina very briefly when she'd been on the Enterprise, she hadn't even spoken to the goddamned girl who must have had some kind of photographic memory stupid poor idiot girl!  
  
Father Grigory rose. Uhura didn't dare look at Pavel but from the corner of her eye she could see that he was doing a very good job of keeping his face passive, of just following along with the drama unfolding before him.  
  
Well, nothing to lose now, "Oh, my yes! Irina...Irina uh...Gali...Gali...I'm sorry I've forgotten your name, but yes, I remember you. You were with Dr. Sevrin weren't you?"  
  
Irina stepped forward, her voice high pitched, demanding. "Why are you here!" Standard again.  
  
"I'm on leave. Enterprise is docked. I rented a yaght and I'm on vacation."  
  
"Where is Pavel?" this was the Czarina, but in Russian.   
  
"Did you say, Pavel?" Uhura asked meekly, feigning ignorance of the language.  
  
The Czarina nodded and Uhura answered, "He's on the Enterprise. You know Pavel Chekov?"  
  
Oh, brother! Uhura thought, I'm playing this innocent routine as far as it will go! 'Don't move Pavel! Don't say a goddamned word!' she thought fiercely in his direction, willing him to hear her.  
  
The Czarina looked at her cousin, who she was meeting for the first time as Brother Cherneyevsky, on the day of his wedding.  
  
She spoke to him in Russian, "Brother, we are sorry for the interruption of your wedding."  
  
Pavel bowed to his cousin, "Czarina! No apology necessary!"  
  
The Czarina turned to Father Grigory, "My lord, we may deal with these issues AFTER the wedding!"  
  
The Czar, Father Grigory, turned to his Czarina and smiled and Uhura was stunned to the core. He looked on her with adoration, affection, reverence.   
  
He turned to his flock, smiled, it was a beautiful smile, full of good humour, "On with the wedding!"  
  
A collective sigh of relief swept the little room but the bride didn't look the least bit relieved, she looked shaken and upset as she took her place before her betrothed.  
  
She did not look up at him and Pavel knew what she was thinking suddenly and he didn't like himself very much for it. She was thinking of him. She was thinking of him and she was marrying this other man she barely knew. She was thinking of him because she still loved him. He knew that, he knew it from their mutual friends, one of whom had called him a 'goddamned asshole' and said she would love to slap him but it wouldn't make him any less an asshole.  
  
He had screwed up with her. He knew that. He'd tried to fix it. He'd only made it worse. They were impossible together, that's all there was to it.   
  
They were impossible, he and this girl whose hand he was sliding a ring onto...this girl he was kissing for the first time in years...it always felt the same, like the sun rising inside his heart. 


End file.
